The Politics Of: The Border Wall

The murder of Mollie Tibbetts has become one of the playing pieces in the center of the chessboard over the immigration debate because she was killed by an illegal immigrant (or, well, maybe?). The reaffirmed calls for The Wall are based on the idea that her murder was preventable: if we had a gigantic border-wall, the photogenic Tibbetts would still be alive!

The Omnivore, of course, knows better--so he asked his Twitter Trump-Voters / Trump Voters to explain their feelings about immigration, Tibbetts, and The Wall.

• She: She doesn't care for a wall, specifically--but she wants strong borders. She feels that the killing was worse than otherwise because "the killer didn't belong here." 
• He: He wants a giant wall--and, for some reason, believes one is being built (he also wants sensors, tunnel prevention, etc.). When pressed, he was unable to prioritize between moves that would save more lives for the estimated 20bn price tag (such as spending that money combating opioid addiction, a bi-partisan initiative that would pass in a heartbeat if not for the price-tag) and The Wall--which he wants. He decided, after little consideration, that "we could just do both!" . . . it's only 40Bn. We've got the money.

Uh-huh.

What The Wall Means

The reason The Wall has such currency in the minds of the Trump Voters is that it is a massive, powerful symbolic gesture telling Them (the Mexicans, the Latinos) to stay on their side and reaffirming to "Us"--the white Trump-voting-base that this is our country! This is why it gets top billing in the stadium chants along with "Lock Her Up" (the result of various liberal victories as a narcissistic wound [ do not '@ me' as the kids say ] to the Trump base ].

People who have studied illegal immigration know that:

1. Most illegal immigrants come over legally and then overstay their visas (meaning a wall is pointless)
2. The Wall itself is a massive waste of resources which will involve the government essentially seizing land from Americans in many cases using Imminent Domain. 
3. Will involve a bunch of unpalatable decisions (in very rough terrain do we go for the super-expensive 'follow-the-shoreline' approach? Illegally seize land from Mexico by building a straighter-wall south of the border? Defacto give up American soil building a more-or-less straight-wall north of the border? What?).
4. Democrats approved and Obama delivered over 700 miles of improved border fencing--many times what Trump's attempts, to-date have managed.
5. Illegal immigrants--by the best stats we've got--are less likely to commit violent crimes than the general populace. Sure, some do--but in terms of an anti-death or anti-violence problem, illegal immigration doesn't rate.

Good People / Bad People

Trump was derided as racist for his campaign-launching speech where the said that Mexico was not sending us "their best"--they were sending criminals, rapists, and so on--some were maybe good people. Trump-defenders argued that the racist charge was incorrect: Trump wasn't talking about all Mexicans--those who stay on their side were omitted from his description!

If that defense makes sense to you, The Omnivore has some bad news: you're wrong.

Trump was tapping into a very real, very present position by what would become his base that these immigrants (illegal, yes--but Miller would expand that greatly to legal immigrants from the shithole countries) are just bad people (mostly). You can couch this in economic terms. You can talk about cultural differences (as though the American "Quiverfull" culture was any better for being American than some of the other word cultures in these shithole nations)--but eventually it all comes down to the same thing: it's a kind of blanket bigotry that has an emotional grip but doesn't stand up to rational examination.

You have seen this before: "Jew-bashing isn't racist--the Arabs are also semitic!" You know it is bullshit when a Nazi says it. It's also bullshit here.

How Do We Know?

How does The Omnivore (remember Always Right (TM)) know this? Simple. There's a test: you ask the Trump Voter what s/he thinks the problem with Illegal Immigration is. If it's "Because they killed Mollie Tibbetts" you point out that, yes, that was bad--but spending 20bn on a wall would save the lives of far fewer Americans than spending it on, say, more policing, addiction recovery, and so on.

When confronted with the evidence it turns out they don't really care about how many people we save--just saving the right ones: the few Americans killed by the bad people.

But The Omnivore got an even weirder answer from another Trump Voter: The problem with Illegal Immigration is that it is illegal.

The Trump Voter in question said "These people just don't belong here." (Emphasis by The Omnivore)--and then proceeded to try to get The Omnivore to admit that "crossing the border was illegal so it was . . . illegal."

Argument by tautology is a sign your position sucks.

The woman, even when asked clearly, repeatedly, and directly why border crossing was illegal couldn't get her head around the question. She couldn't name the harm done by it (to her credit, she acknowledged that the murder-rate wasn't the key issue here)--but beyond that? Who is the victim of this crime? What are the damages?

A big one: Why is first-time illegal border crossing just a misdemeanor? Consider that the other Trump-voter (He) wanted to make 3x re-entry a capital offence--he wants to potentially execute people who come back too often.

When pressed on that, he repeatedly said that these people would be committing horrible crimes (to which The Omnivore pointed out, in vain, that they could already be executed for--you don't need a new death-penalty crime for crossing). He didn't get it.

No--the problem here is that in the Trump-voter's mind, illegal crossing, numbers, facts, and evidence aside--is inextricably bound up with a concept that "These are the wrong people--the bad ones--who do not belong"--and therefore any crime they commit, kind of like a hate crime--is somehow worse.

Why Do We Have Borders?

This logical knot Trump Voters have gotten into is easily severed by answering the question: why do we have borders in the first place? The answer goes back to way, way before Mexicans with cantaloupe sized calves were crossing the American dusty desert.

It has to do with sovereignty--control over national boundaries--and the ownership of land. The people crossing back and forth are, historically, not the problem. To be sure: you want control and knowledge over who is coming and going. You want the capability to bar the door.

A literally Open Border would be a massive risk for terrorist or enemy attack--but a somewhat porous border? A terror cell that can get to Mexico can also get to America and will not add the operational risk--today--of a difficult border crossing by foot (especially as Jihadis would stand out among the Latinos who would probably not want them going along the path).

In other words, the crime of illegal crossing doesn't have a victim: that's why it's a misdemeanor. The presence of illegal immigrants can have positive or negative effects--but these are debatable. The act of illegal entry  is about as close to victimless as crimes get.

Conclusions

For the Trump Voters the issue seems very bizarre: people who are not buying the "I'm not racist--I'm just against illegal immigration with passion" seem (to the Trump Voter) to be advocating for open borders (to be sure, some people out there are--these people are stupid and there don't seem to be very many of them). 

When the Trump Voter is upset about the for-real tragic killing of Mollie Tibbetts, the non-Trumper seems to want to cover for her assailant. That looks . . . horrifying . . . to the Trumper. 

And the worst of all is that most people, when they react to the bigoted (racist) subtext of the immigration debate don't consciously clarify what they are seeing. Most people don't say "The statement isn't explicitly racist--but the intent behind it clearly is--and here's why . . ." So the Trump Voter feels they are being called racist as a reflexive put-down when they are (self) righteous.

The Omnivore's suggestion here is to engage enough to see if you can identify the underlying emotional center of their position (one of the Trump-Voters was upset that illegal immigrants could vote in local school board elections--as their kids attend schools, the community wanted all the parents to have a voice--but he felt that this was just wrong. On behalf of the community he doesn't live in, of course--with respect to parents with kids he doesn't have, of course).

Once you identify it . . . well, The Omnivore hears Hillary has a basket somewhere . . .