Show me your papers, eh?

The following is an editorial by guest author Gerald Mueller, the Strom Thurmond Chair of Conservative Thought at the University of Cascadia.

Rule breaking!!

Last time I wrote about babies. They’re milking this country for all it’s worth and we all know it. But you probably haven’t heard about the second major threat facing our economy: Immigrants. Yes, immigrants. And I’m not talking about the kind that God sends to subdue a wild and fertile continent — those days are over. I’m talking about the kind of immigrant that sneaks across your border and steals your job without so much as asking.

Pretty much everything I said about babies goes for immigrants as well. They steal our jobs, feed at the public trough, and don’t pay taxes. And the worst of them even come over here and make more babies. So I’ll get right to the nub of the issue: What are we going to do about it?

The first thing to do is to get angry – but if you’ve read this far then you already are, so we can safely skip ahead to step #2: Channel that anger into something productive. I recommend doing something to support legislation aimed at cracking down on illegal immigrants. Contact your legislators, talk to your neighbors, or write a polemic in your nationally syndicated weekly newspaper column.

Which is why I’m writing today in support of LD 1836, now being considered by the Maine Senate. Most of you will remember Arizona SB 1070. What some of my more liberal readers might not realize is that the “show me your papers” provision of SB 1070 wasn’t just a racist measure singling out Hispanics for profiling — which is why Republican state legislators along our northern border are pushing for similar legislation.

Action on the issue can’t come fast enough. The crime rate among babies is no higher than among the population at large. By contrast, the continuing influx of Canadians is likely to bring with it much of the violent crime for which Canada is known.

Henry Cline of the Westfield Police Department echoes this widespread concern among law enforcement officials. Cline says he is worried that violence might spill over the border as Canadian gangs battle for control of the maple syrup trade. “Syrup from the latest heist is still showing up on breakfast tables across the Northeast,” says Cline, referring to the 2012 theft of six million pounds of maple syrup from a “syrup cartel” in Quebec. “We need to find that syrup — before the cartel comes looking.”

The syrup wars have taken their toll on the region, with Maine seeing a 22% spike in new diabetes cases in the last five years. Of course, the real solution to the problem isn’t to find some contraband syrup, but rather to implement appropriate border controls. In 2008 the Urban Institute estimated that between 65,000 and 75,000 undocumented Canadians live in the US. While this pales in comparison to the 6 million or more illegal Mexican immigrants, it’s at least 65,000 Canadians too many.

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