That Time I Triggered Ben Shapiro (on Immigration)

Politicon 2017 was fun.

I was just reviewing all the things that I participated in at the Convention.

At the Ben Shapiro Town Hall, I wanted to ask him a question, but the line of young people, including Millennials, was too great. There was no way that I could get a question in edge-wise.

The last question that came up before Shapiro had to head for the Big Debate with Cenk Uygur.

This video clip features that final question, Shapiro's response, and our outrage with part of his answer:

"Do you support for believe in amnesty for those who are illegally in the US, and I mean those who haven't committed any crimes" besides being in the country illegally?"

His answer was controversial and in a sense disconcerting:

"I am not in favor of amnesty as a blanket matter."

Then he shared that we should treat immigrants, whether legal or illegal, by one standard: are they a net direct benefit to the country?

I do not agree with that standard. If an individual broke into this country, broke the law breaking into this country, then they need to go.

Period.

"The truth is on immigration, I would be completely Libertarian expect for basically three factors:

1. Citizenship and the ability to vote, because not all cultures are the same or equal.

2. The law-abiding question. You can't have a free, open border if you can't gauge who is coming into the country

3. The welfare question. If you have a welfare system for everyone that comes into the country,  obviously you have to gauge who is coming into the country.

Well, so far so good, I guess. The issue of ensuring citizenship as the basis for a certain, assured, American culture is paramount. I welcomed his response on that issue.

Then his response got more meandering and liberal.

"My view of people who are already here illegally is that if you are here, and you are of net benefit to the United States, then we should find a way for your to stay."

NOPE!

I emphatically disagree with this line of thinking. We have one rule of law, and to give any number of people a pass for breaking into this country would further undermine the rule of law. Shapiro never mentions the construction of a wall, a clear barrier to block en masse illegal entry. I will chock that up to the time constraints which he was dealing with.

But the idea that we can pick and choose individually who stays and who goes? That is more lawlessness, that is more corruption. We cannot have one set of laws for people getting deported, and then another deciding with arbitrary discretion who stays.

Shapiro also found it "bewildering" that people would want to respond to the illegal immigration issue in any other way besides individual cases. The Left wants to grant everyone amnesty, and some people on the right want to deport everyone in the country illegally.

I am one of the latter at this point. I discussed this matter with many people, and it was not a bewildering process.

Shapiro continued to defend his answer:

"There are people who have been in the country for 20 years doing a job, who are not on welfare, and whose kids are in college. Why would it be good for the US to kick them out?"

Harim Uzziel

Harim Uzziel and I disagreed with this line of argument. "They're illegal."

Shapiro actually responded to us:

"I understand they're illegal. I also understand that if I were living across the border, and I were living in a third-world crap-hole like Mexico currently is, I would also be trying with my family to hop that border ..."

My response:

"So you're calling illegal immigration an "Act of Love?" But it's not an act of love to undermine our laws, Ben."

He tried to justify it, based on the argument of "Net benefit to the country" argument. 

But what does that mean?

"If someone comes here illegally, and nobody knows about it, and now they are working for the Defense Department, they're a solider in the US military ..."

My response:

"They shouldn't have into the country in the first place. We have to have a nation of laws."

His retort?

"Then you fill their spot in the military!"

Ouch! Someone got really mad! What difference does it make whether I serve or do not serve in the military? The point is that our nation's sovereignty, our nation's laws are violated every time someone breaks into this country illegally. The compassion of the American People has been pushed to its limit. No one has the right to determine by individual or crowd-sized basis whether

Final Reflection

What is happening to some conservatives, especially the celebrity circuit like Shapiro, George Will, and the rest?

They are slipping on some issues, and they have gone all out against President Trump. I for one am completely sick of this conservative elitism. Give me a break, people.

Not only did this make me sick, to hear him justify keeping certain people in the country illegal because of some net benefit argument, but that he had no problem with lawbreakers staying in the country to continue serving in government agencies! That is outrageous! Republican activists are working with hard-core conservative members of the House to strip away an amendment which would allow DACA recipients to serve in the federal government. Unreal. Do we really need to make the Deep State any deeper?

No. All of this misplaced compassion and discretion has to stop. I agree with Ann Coulter on this one. I do not believe in separating families. If one member of the family is in the country illegally, the rest of the family can go with the illegal. Lieutenant Governor Candidate David Hernandez wants to open up prisons in Mexico or other countries to repatriate illegal aliens and keep the families together.

Works for me.

I am also tired of these amnesty proponents falling back on illegals who have served in the United States military. They should not have entered the country in the first place. All of this is wrong. We are a nation of laws, and Americans' dreams must come first.

Let's call out the obvious: On one hand Shapiro opposes blanket amnesty, but he is willing to grant amnesty of a sort for those who have lived in the country illegally for a long time. This kind of misplaced compassion is based on media or popular compulsion in my view. This kind of talk is the real cause of bewilderment, not the basic argument that if you are in this country illegally, you need to be deported. Period.

Notice once again in the video above that when I called out this argument as "act of love", Shapiro got testy and blurted out "I'm not Jeb Bush." Well ... Notice also that Ben never talked about the negative impacts of rising immigration levels, whether legal or illegal, on American workers.

What a shame. There are still so many conservative leading minds--like Bill Kristol, Jonah Goldberg, and I guess Ben Shapiro, too--who have not learned the importance of manufacturing and industrial labor to the United States economy and the electorate.

How did Ronald Reagan win in 1984? Working class "Reagan" Democrats who saw jobs coming back and a rebirth of manufacturing. The same holds true for Donald Trump, who paid attention to the destructive trade deals hurting American workers while benefiting aloof crony corporate interests and hostile foreign countries.

Wake up, conservatives. Economic policy must benefit Americans, and that includes immigration. Illegal aliens breaking into this country are not providing a direct benefit to us. They need to be deported and come back legally. End of story.