[Cross-posted at
The Left Coaster]
"The simple truth is that if you break the law to come to this country, you will not respect it once you're here."
--Representative Patrick McHenry (R-NC), 05/16/06
Republicans say stupid offensive things all the time, but I do feel the need this morning to sink this ridiculous raft of an idea that floated down the American flotsam of political dialogue yesterday. I wouldn't want any of our new brothers and sisters to have their citizenship crippled by believing the idiocy above, and I want them to know there was a time, not too long ago, either, when an American legislator would really understand and uphold the law instead of making an ass of himself like this.
In the first place, coming here illegally will not automatically result in disrespect for the law--hell, the United States has the greatest prison population in the world full of inmates who were born here and said the pledge of allegiance every day. Even the American Executive Branch, bastion of the oldest democracy on earth, has citizens who were born here who cannot respect the law.
There was Claude Allen, a White House honcho who liked to rip off Target stores. Before him Scooter Libby got arrested--he was the Vice President's Chief of Staff. It was reported that the Domestic Policy Advisor, Karl Rove, was indicted last Friday, but he doesn't seem worried.
Congress? Duke Cunningham, he was born here and was a great Korean fighter pilot, too, but he recently plead guilty to many felonies. There's an ongoing investigation by the FBI into a party-prostitution ring on the Hill, along with all the bribery Cunningham spread around.
Judicial Branch? Get this, in 1999 the Supreme Court stopped an election in hideous contortions that eventually gave us the bowel movement of Bush vs Gore, where none of the lies in the theft were proclaimed to be relevant to the future. Just this once, you see, the law can be chucked in the trash to steal the election but everything will be all right, trust us, suckers.
Of course George Bush, concretely shown the law meant nothing as far as hew as concerned, went right out and broke any law he felt like. Conserving the environment, starting a war, torturing prisoners, using phosphorous on civilian targets in Iraq, spying on Americans, coddling the felons who outed Valerie Plame...the list is very, very long indeed of laws he's given the finger to.
The hilarious part, it's just a riot, that when Bush got totally caught breaking the law he said the law meant nothing to the President--the new King is here, our revolution and 225 years of legislative history and jurisprudence just flushed down the toilet with his ascension of theft. So this idiot McHenry, a legislator sworn and tasked with creating the law, flaps his lips about respecting it while his own president publicly makes a total surreal farce of his existence and citizenship. All day, every day.
It's a little confusing, of course: huge numbers of Americans actually do respect the law and never break it, any of it, for any reason, but unfortunately none of these citizens seem to be in charge of any part of the government. Theses respectful citizens live this way because they want to, but of course if they stray a massive, extremely thorough coercive structure is in place to throw their ass in jail fast--rules and the law are only relevant to those oppressed, not the lying leadership.
I just wanted to make all this clear; I am a very small person of no distinction whatsoever, but at least in the United States technology is still respected, so publishing is easy, but as we all know, despite what that lying moron McHenry says, respect for the law by the liars who pretend to lead us is a sick joke. No one is fooled, and this ridiculous, horrifying embarrassing show of "respect for the law" will, unfortunately, go on. Americans seem quaintly attached to the idea.