RUSH: From the Washington Times, oral arguments — a little tease here — oral arguments, the Arizona immigration law. “Supreme Court Casts Doubt on ObamaÂ’s Immigration Law Claim — Supreme Court justices took a dim view of the Obama administrationÂ’s claim that it can stop Arizona from enforcing immigration laws…” That’s what this is about. Obama is suing Arizona for essentially enforcing federal immigration law. Arizona created its own law because the Feds were not patrolling the border, securing the border, so Arizona said, “Okay, we’ll do it ourselves,” and Obama is suing the state of Arizona, and that’s what the oral arguments are about today.
And the Washington Times is reporting: “Supreme Court justices took a dim view of the Obama administrationÂ’s claim that it can stop Arizona from enforcing immigration laws, telling government lawyers during oral argument Wednesday that the state appears to want to push federal officials, not conflict with them.” And that is exactly right. The justices have it exactly right. Arizona just wants some help. They weren’t trying to push against or conflict with Obama. They were asking for help.
Chief Justice John Roberts said, “It seems to me the federal government just doesnÂ’t want to know whoÂ’s here illegally.” Wow. That is a profundity. Well, it’s not a profundity. It’s a profound statement. For the Chief Justice of the United States, after listening to the government lawyers, say, “It seems to me the federal government just doesnÂ’t want to know whoÂ’s here illegally.” And he’s exactly right. Make no bones, folks, I know it sounds sort of incomprehensible, but I’m telling you that the Democrat Party is looking at as many illegals as possible turning into voters. That’s why they don’t want photo ID at the polling place. It is the number one reason why. There is no other reason. It’s not because it’s racist, or because it’s Big Brother-ish. That’s not the reason. They want to be able to have people who aren’t legally registered to vote, vote. If you have to have a photo ID, then you’re shut out, if you’re illegal.
“Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. said the federal government has limited resources and should have the right to determine the extent of calls it gets about possible illegal immigrants. … But even Democratic-appointed justices were uncertain of that.”
The wise Latina, Sonia Sotomayor, said, “IÂ’m terribly confused by your answer.”
Sotomayor, the wise Latina, telling the government lawyer, Don Verrilli, the same guy, smarter than everybody; he went to Columbia, you know. That means he’s smarter than all of us. He said the government has limited resources. What a crock that is. What, are all the Secret Service agents down in Colombia? What do you mean by that? For somebody in this day and age, where the federal government is everywhere, for this guy to say the federal government has limited resources? They just hired 4,000 new IRS agents. What the hell is that about, for the health care law. Limited resources?
So he says the federal government has limited resources and should have the right to determine the extent of calls it gets about possible illegal immigrants. Meaning somebody calls us, we ought to have the right to say we’re not gonna do anything about it or we will do something about it, it’s totally up to us. And Sonia Sotomayor, there’s a law about that out there. You can’t come to this country illegally. And the solicitor general is essentially saying, “Well, if we choose not to do anything about it, ’cause our resources are limited.” She says, “What? I’m confused by your answer.” The wise Latina, Sonia Sotomayor, “went on to say that the federal government can always decline to pick up illegal immigrants when Arizona officials call.”
Eric Holder and others in the administration have claimed that Arizona’s attempt to enforce federal law is an assault on the federal government, which is crazy. But that’s what he said. Now, Elena Kagan has recused herself from this one. Yes, she has. Well, because she was involved. It makes no sense to recuse herself from this, but not health care. But she recused herself because she said she was too close to this one. So since she has recused herself, this is probably going to be upheld. Arizona might win this thing. Of course if it’s 4-4, yeah, if it’s 4-4, it stays. So, anyway, it’s fascinating to watch this. The Washington Times story goes on to portray Verrilli as out of his league again, the government lawyer.
Now, folks, I had this yesterday, I didn’t get to it. But know this. New York Senator Chuck-U Schumer said yesterday or the day before that the Democrats are going to pass new legislation to bypass the Supreme Court, if the Supreme Court finds for Arizona here. If the Supreme Court finds that Arizona’s within its rights to enforce the immigration laws that it wrote, Chuck-U Schumer says that Congress is going to pass a new law saying Arizona can’t. No state can. No state can have its own immigration laws. So Democrats expect to lose this, and Chuck-U is sitting around waiting to put his new law forward, bring it forward if this happens.
Now, since we’re talking about the Hispanic vote, Jonathan Tobin, Commentary magazine, “Myths About the Hispanic Vote.” Let me give you a couple of pull quotes from this story. By the way, you know “myth” is another word for “conventional wisdom.” Conventional wisdom is what supposedly the smart people all agree on, whatever it is. “The conventional wisdom is Obama can’t lose.” That’s a myth. That’s an example.
One pull quote from the story. “The assumption that Hispanic voters are a monolithic group with similar backgrounds and points of view about the issue is also a simplification that has a lot more to do with the desire of pundits and political scientists to make points than it does with political reality.”
Have you ever noticed that leftist pundits, when talking about women, monolithic. All women think the same way. All women vote the same way. All women are soccer moms. Whatever the Democrat structure of the day is in terms of a campaign and how to get votes from a certain group; they’re all the same. Women think the same way; they act the same way; they do the same things. And the same thing with Hispanics. They’re monolithic. That’s the way the left looks at every one of these groups and they’re to be managed and controlled in that way.
The next pull quote. Unlike blacks and Jews, “Hispanics are getting more Republican the longer they are in the country. That will present a problem for President Obama and other Democrats who assume they can use the immigration issue to increase their electoral advantage.” Now, the Republicans have thought this, too. I can’t leave them out. The Republicans, all through the early 2000s, believed that the Hispanic vote was monolithic. McCain (imitating McCain) “Comprehensive, meaningful immigration reform.” Yeah, whatever that was called. Meaningful comprehensive immigration reform. It was all about the Hispanic vote. And there were dreams from the upper levels of the Republican Party in the early 2000s.
Don’t doubt me on this. There were wild dreams that if we came out for a policy that was amnesty but wasn’t called that, that we’d send a signal to all Hispanics, “Hey, we’re not your enemy like the Democrats say,” and we’d get their vote. There were dreams of the Republican Party becoming a majority party for as far as we can see using the Hispanic vote, securing the Hispanic vote, and using the immigration issue as a means of getting it with sort of a wink-and-nod amnesty. Now, if you ever called it “amnesty,” you heard for them. Like I’d call it “amnesty” and I’d hear from ’em. I had to get my mind right a couple times.
Sometimes I was called to meet them. Sometimes they came to meet me in my home, Republicans, to tell me what was what and how I was wrong and misunderstanding the objective here. So both parties have tried, and here’s the problem this, folks. You want to get people to vote for you? Particularly if you’re Republican, you want to get people to vote for you? Just articulate conservatism to ’em. But if you’re gonna pander to people as members of groups, then you first have to treat them as victims, and that’s insulting. As far as I’m concerned, I don’t want to attract people to my side of the aisle by telling them they’re victims and I’m gonna take care of ’em.
I’m gonna tell ’em about the greatness of America. I’m going say, if they’re new arrivals, “You want to be in this country because of the opportunity? Well, here’s how you get it!” I wouldn’t base my campaign on ethnicity or race or gender or orientation. I’d base it all on conservative ideology and then contrast it with the liberalism that is on display every day with Obama and the Democrats. But that’s what Tobin has basically done here in Commentary magazine. He has exploded all these myths about the Hispanic vote, and one of the big myths is that all they care about is immigration, legal or illegal.
The Hispanics who are here, they might care about it a bit, but it’s not the animating issue. It’s not the number one issue. Now, if you listen to La Raza you could be convinced it is. If you listen to leftist Hispanic organizations –which are no different than leftist feminist organizations or leftist gay organizations. The key is they’re leftist. Everything else falls by the wayside. So immigration, illegal immigration is a big deal to the left because it’s a source of voters. The Democrats are losing voters. They have to replace them. They’re aborting voters. Literally! They are aborting their own future voters. They need new voters. The illegal population is a goldmine for ’em. That’s why they don’t want photo ID to vote.
That’s the fastest way to kill that potential voting bloc. They use ACORN and these other community-organizers group to intimidate people at polling places (such as in Philadelphia and the New Black Panther Party) for illegal or noncitizens to vote. Pure and simple. The other bit of news on this that’s interesting is the fact I mentioned at the top of the program, that almost as many illegals are leaving the country now as are arriving. And I predict to you that if this trend keeps up, it won’t be long before the Democrats all of a sudden start supporting a fence, this time to keep them in. The purpose of the fence, of course, is to keep the illegals out. But if the illegals are leaving as fast as they’re arriving, that’s a net zero.
“Why are they leaving, Mr. Limbaugh? You’re just making that up!”
No, no, no, I’m not making it up. We’re in a recession, that’s why! The Mexican economy happens to be doing better than ours. Snerdley, you’re acting like you haven’t heard any of this. This is news to you? The Mexican economy, in sectors, is doing better than ours is. That wouldn’t be too hard. It would not too hard to find an economy around the world doing better than ours. The Brits, by the way, just entered their double dip. They just into a new recession just this week. It’s now official, and we’re headed that way. Durable goods orders are way down. Housing prices are still plummeting. We’re headed toward a double dip, I tell you.
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RUSH: Look, Snerdley. Mexico’s drilling for oil. We’re not. We’ve talked about it. Mexico’s GDP for 2010 is 5.5% Ours is under 2%. Mexico is predicting 3.5% GDP for this year, but we’re nowhere near that. We’re revising our GDP down. They report 2.5% but we end up under 2%. There’s no economic growth going on here and there’s no real job creation happening here. And that’s why illegal immigrants here are leaving at almost as rapid a rate as others are arriving.
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RUSH: Here’s a great question from Scalia to the solicitor general, Verrilli. “What does sovereignty mean if it does include the ability to defend your borders?” Great, great, great question.
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RUSH: Scalia with another great question of the solicitor general, “Virility,” about sovereignty. “What is sovereignty if you can’t protect your own borders?” Apparently the oral arguments today in the Arizona immigration case were just as bad for the government as they were during health care. And upholding the Arizona law is even more popular among American voters than striking down Obamacare, which is high! Obamacare hasn’t lost any ground. This is just huge, according to a recent Quinnipiac poll.
According to them, “When asked, should the US Supreme Court overturn the 2010 health care law, voters said they should by 49 to 38%. But voters say the Supreme Court should uphold the Arizona immigration law by 62% to 27%.” I think that’s a reason why Obama and his minions in the news today are barely even talking about this. This is hardly being discussed at all in the Drive-By Media. Commentaries are not mentioning it at all. The news that I’m sharing with you is coming from the Washington Times, the quotes from Justices Sotomayor and Scalia in the oral arguments. Here, Scalia asked, “What does sovereignty mean if it does not include the ability to defend your borders?”
Which is right up there with his broccoli question. I have never understood why this is complex or why it’s complicated. The state of Arizona wants to protect its borders. They want the federal government to enforce the law. Federal government isn’t, so Arizona wrote their own, basically replicating federal law. Obama sues Arizona. Obama doesn’t want photo ID to vote. It’s clear what’s going on. I’ve had a lot of people e-mailing me: “What do you mean, illegal immigrants are leaving the country as fast as they’re coming?” Well, I have a story here from Washington Times, Charles Hurt (Hurt used to be at the New York Post) and it’s an opinion piece.
“In this Economy, US Needs Border Fence – to Keep Mexicans In — Well, thatÂ’s one way to stem the tide of illegal aliens streaming across the border from Mexico. Jack up unemployment rates to near double digits, dunk America into a double-dip recession and put us so deeply into hock with the Chinese communists that it will take generations for us to recover. After long enough, living and working and trying to eke out bare survival in America becomes even worse than trying to get by in Mexico. A new study from the highly esteemed Pew Hispanic Center says the millions of Mexicans who risked their lives crossing the desert to get here … have given up on the U.S.
“This is no small feat. Have you ever been to Mexico? Not the ritzy beach towns with the gated resorts, but Nuevo Laredo? The dusty streets are filled with bony children selling gum and candy for just a few spare pennies.” Anyway, his whole piece, Mr. Hurt’s whole piece here is about the exodus of illegals from America back to Mexico. And again, you know what this puts a little bit of a lie to? One thing that is not shrinking in this country is the welfare state. One of the arguments has always been that the illegals are coming here because of the hammock. Not the safety net, the hammock. They’re coming here to get on our welfare state. Health care and so forth, and clearly a number did come for that reason.
But wouldn’t you think that if it were the primary reason, there would not be this exodus? People do come to this country for opportunity. They do come to this country to want to work. And when the work isn’t available, when the jobs aren’t there, they don’t come — and that is happening. This report from the Peeeeeew Center says that immigration is at its lowest point, even negative for the first time since the Great Depression. (chuckles) Now, some might want to praise Obama for that, but nevertheless, it’s not as attractive. And, folks, that is saying something. That is. Hurt is exactly right.
Mexico’s economy is growing at 5.5%, there are parts of it that are doing fine and are drilling for oil, but it’s still racked with poverty and drug crime and pestilence and all that stuff. And still immigration is down. And another thing about the Hispanic vote. The notion that Hispanics will come here and will vote Democrat for the opportunity to be taken care of, to be installed into the welfare system? Well, if that’s why Hispanics are coming here — just to vote Democrat and get in on those goodies — then they’d keep coming, would they not? You have to think that if Hispanics would be happy with the subsistence existence the Democrats offer, they’d stay in Mexico.
So there are a lot of myths here that are blowing up right in front of our eyes, and it’s not good news for the Democrats. It isn’t good news. The fact that these immigration numbers are down means to the Democrats that these people are not eager to come here and become wards of the state. The Democrats — and I’ve mentioned this before. The Democrats need a permanent underclass. Politically that… (interruption) Now, now, now! Wait, wait! Don’t overreact. For those of you new to the program, don’t overreact here. I know saying something like that draws the reaction, “How can you possibly say that?” If you just listen to me for a second, you’ll see.
Look at me. The Democrat Party… Look at the story we had yesterday from Michael Barone about the nostalgia the Democrats have for union assembly line jobs. You come out of high school, you go to work for Ford or Chrysler or General Motors on the line. It’s basically the only job you can get ’cause all you’ve got is a high school diploma, and that’s America as they see it. The Democrats look out across this country and see teams of incompetent people; teams of inept people who need guidance, assistance, to be taken care of, and all of that. So you work on the line for 30 years, then you quit, and get your pension and your health care for the rest of your life.
And that’s America.
And that’s the nostalgia.
And that’s what Obama’s trying to recreate, only this time with green jobs.
Well, of course that’s not America. That’s part of it, but there are a lot of other people that want to do something eastern that. But those are the jobs the Democrats are trying to re-create. But the Democrat Party must have a permanent underclass. That’s the voting base. The “permanent underclass” is simply poor people who have no alternative but than to vote Democrat for a meager subsistence. Every form of welfare — food stamp, whatever you want to call it — that’s what the Democrats need. They need people needing them. And the Democrats want to use illegal immigrants to expand the underclass.
In a growing economy (which we don’t have right now), people escape the fourth and fifth quintiles, or the lower levels of poverty, and their lives improve. They earn more money. They become middle class, then upper-middle class, and they don’t need government anymore. Well, those people have to be replaced. In a political world where all you care about is winning elections and you don’t care what happens to the country in the process, and you will don’t care what happens to the people who vote for you, you need a certain kind of voter if your basic political position is that you’re the king of the welfare state. You’re the king of compassion. You’re the guy who’s gonna take care of the little people. You’re the guy that cares about the little guy. You’re the party that cares about the little guy.
The Republicans, they only care about the rich. The Republicans, they only care about big business. That’s the line. That’s the template. The Democrats, they’re the ones with big hearts. They’re the ones with all the compassion. They’re the ones that care about the little guy. Of course, their policies keep little guys little forever. They need a permanent underclass, and the Hispanic illegals are who they have in mind to be their underclass and to expand it. It’s another reason why the Democrat Party is in full support of illegal immigration. Once they are here, they have to eat. Once they are here they need health care. And guess who’s willing to provide it? Using your money. Redistribution of wealth. And so whatever the number is, the number of millions a year who would arrive here illegally, that’s the Democrat Party’s permanent underclass.
The problem that we’re seeing for the Democrats is that, guess what? Many of these illegals don’t want to be a permanent member of the underclass. They come here like anybody else who comes here. There are exceptions of course. They want to access the opportunity that exists here. I know some of them don’t learn English. I’m not trying to paint a panacea, but I’m also telling you that they’re not all the same. They’re not all bad actors. They’re not all welfare state cheats. Some of them, I think the vast majority, are decent human beings who want what every other human being wants: the best life possible. It used to be this is the place you came for that. But if all the Democrats want from you if you’re an illegal Hispanic is a member of the permanent underclass and that’s not you, then you might not be willing to stay.
If Hispanics are coming to the United States for a better life, they aren’t gonna vote Democrat for very long. And I’ll tell you, I mean this from the bottom of my heart when I say it. If you’re coming to the United States for a better life, you better not vote Democrat. You’re not gonna get a better life. You’re gonna get a life of dependence and your gonna end up being in a permanent underclass. And again, I’m gonna go back to Barone. That piece yesterday, I don’t know if he knows how great that was in terms of portraying or painting a picture of the ideal job that Obama and Democrats have in mind. The ideal job, the best thing you can ever get is an assembly line gig, 30 years, you retire and get benefits and health care taken care of for you. Low expectations. Because you don’t think much of the country. Plus, if you happen to be a wealthy Democrat, you don’t want to share your money with anybody else. You’ll be glad to tax everybody else and share their money.
But if you want a better life — by the way, this is, I think, true even for people who are not illegal immigrants or Hispanic. If you’re just a native-born American and you want a better life, voting Democrat is not the thing to do. “Mr. Limbaugh, that is so outrageous for you to say that. I don’t believe that you would have the gumption.” I happen to believe it, Mr. New Castrati, and I think the evidence is on my side. Just listen to your average Democrat talk about life in this country. Listen to your average Democrat talk about the future of this country. It’s not this great shining city on a hill stuff. It’s not filled with optimism. It’s not filled with the pursuit of happiness. The Democrat vision of the future is filled with misery and suffering and discrimination and oppression and racism and sexism and bigotry and oppressive corporations who are trying to kill their customers.
Well, is it not? Is that not the picture of this country you get after listening to a Democrat paint it? The Democrat Party’s not the ticket to a better life. The Democrats need people to be dependent on government so that the people are dependent on Democrats. People that move here, they start on the bottom rung of the ladder, but they want to climb. They don’t want to get stuck on that bottom rung. But that’s where you’ll end up if all you do is vote and invest in and depend on Democrats. I mean, look at Obama. They want a new WPA. They want all these new Depression era programs, government-created jobs and so forth. They yearn for the days when men would dig ditches. What was the stimulus about? Shovel-ready jobs. The stimulus was about digging ditches, repairing roads and bridges. That’s the vision the Democrats have for you. That’s what shovel-ready jobs meant. Are we better off now than we were before Obama? Is life better now under Obama? No way. Not even close.