I CAN STAND IN RED SQUARE AND CRITICIZE REAGAN.

That's a late Cold War era joke about freedom of speech in the Soviet Union, and it might apply, with equal force, to people who can put up twee signs about "no person is illegal" because the illegal immigrants never show up there.

Until they do.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott shipped illegal immigrants to Obamaland (Martha’s Vineyard), Chicago, New York and other deep-blue cities and blue states where Democrats prize themselves on ignoring federal immigration laws.

The two Republican governors fed President Joe Biden and the Democrats what amounts to a hideous tasting sandwich of what the puppy left behind, with extra helpings of hypocrisy sauce. This forced legacy corporate media to finally cover a subject Biden wants to avoid–his failure to maintain a secure Southern border.

Why, it's as if somebody stood in Red Square and criticized Chernenko.

This led to days and days of hideous shrieking, whining, foot stomping, crying and other hysterical temper tantrums by blue-state blue-city politicians, especially mayors like Chicago’s Lori Lightfoot, and other Democrat elites. Democrats talk and talk about how much they love the rule of law.

But they leave the border wide open, and they didn’t push to prosecute Black Lives Matter rioters who destroyed American cities just two summers ago, causing death of innocents and billions of damage to businesses.

Democrats and their allies in corporate media have long championed the breakdown of the rule of federal immigration law by championing “Sanctuary Cities.” But Abbott and DeSantis rubbed their noses in it. Chicago is a “Sanctuary City” and true to form, Mayor Lightfoot displayed her rampant hypocrisy by shipping the new migrant arrivals out to the suburbs. They’re all perfect hypocrites. Were Lightfoot or her fellow local hypocrites criticized by local media? Of course not. The editorial boards wouldn’t dare. They’re all on the same woke team now.

Now Democrats are growling with hackles up, lifting lips and showing teeth.

The current pass was a long time in coming. We'll deal with that, but first we're going to have some fun.

They shriek about DeSantis and Abbot bringing up a few hundred? Yet they said nothing as the Biden Administration secretly flew thousands of illegal immigrants into blue states in the middle of the night without media attention. The Biden White House lied about it. And their media allies let them get away with the lie.

A Milwaukee radio talker solicited opinions on the "stunts."

 Me:

Incoherence at the federal level begets all sorts of things at the state and local level. How easy it was to virtue signal about "sanctuary" until sanctuary-seekers showed up.— Stephen Karlson (@StephenKarlson) September 16, 2022

First, we revel in the discomfiture of the Jarrett regency, and its soft-on-crime brain-brothers in the states.  "The Martha’s Vineyard’s meltdown illustrates the efficacy of a few of Saul Alinsky’s Rules For Radicals."  Follow the link, the attempts of Buckwheat to seem focused are amusing.

In Illinois, and in Massachusetts, the arrival of a few illegal aliens gets the state's National Guard units activated, and another disaster declaration.  "[Texas governor Greg] Abbott’s program is targeting sanctuary cities and their Democratic mayors, and it’s aimed at pressuring the Biden administration to curb border crossings from Mexico." Maybe the Jarrett regency will listen now. Meanwhile, there are people being shuttled about who could use somf food, rest, and certitude.

Nearby, former Countryside mayor Sean McDermott hopes for Illinoisans to be Midwestern Nice.  In his view, the illegal aliens are huddled masses yearning to be free.  That might be so, but the onus on doing right by those people rests with the Federal government.

Abbott doesn’t send the refugees here because he thinks Illinois is more equipped to give them a better life. He sends them to Illinois, or to New York or Washington D.C., because he apparently delights in sowing chaos and discord at the expense of real people’s lives and safety.

That’s not how things are done in Illinois, and it is certainly not how things are done in Countryside. There are infants and women eight months into pregnancy on those buses. No one embarks on a trip like that, under such harsh conditions, unless their need is dire. With that in mind, we must do all we can to lighten the burden, not add to it.

The busloads of people sent from Texas are legal asylum seekers, with every right to temporarily reside in our country while they apply for more permanent refuge. The border agencies have done their work and provided these refugees with legal entry into this country with a future court date to present their asylum claims.

Let me repeat: These people are correctly following a legal process that has been in place for decades. When my grandparents emigrated from Ireland, they followed a similar path of uncertainty and turmoil before finally making the United States their home.

It’s one of the proudest American traditions — the idea that anyone can become part of this great country if they work hard, play by the rules and take the necessary steps to become part of our larger community.

This is what good government is built to do. The work of Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administrations to welcome asylum seekers, despite the lack of notice, is an admirable example of public service at its best.

I'll let others decide what the criteria for working hard, playing by the rules, and taking the necessary steps are, and if not requesting asylum at the first available consulate or helping smuggle contraband to earn passage into Texas or Arizona would meet those criteria. I don't recall anybody in Illinois worrying about the dearth of federal resources in Texas or Arizona, that is, until the busses (some of which are being sent by Democrat politicians in El Paso) started showing up at Union Station, and, let us hope, at the Obama Temple where the steel mill once stood.

Note, though, how quickly Chicago's mayor fobbed the arrivals off on the suburbs, and then sought help from Washington.

If they found the best available housing for these new arrivals in the short term is hotels in surrounding suburbs, then we should respect the decisions they are making in a time of untold stress and limited resources. If your first response is anger or fear directed at people having nowhere to go, I urge you to pull back and look at the bigger picture.

I am extremely proud of the response from my community. Immediately upon hearing of the crisis, I was contacted by numerous residents, faith leaders, business owners and other local elected officials who offered to lend a hand. The residents of our community are caring and compassionate people who are willing to assist others during a time of need.

Mr McDermott's response comes from a position of privilege. If there is any anger to direct, that ought be at the Jarrett regency, for winking at the migration in the first place, and at Chicago's mayor.

Mayor Lightfoot — after getting just a few hundred people in Chicago — is saying the magic words: the Biden Administration has to step up and do something about this. She even says this isn’t a new problem at the border. “This is not a new challenge for us. We need federal support. Resources, communication, and collaboration, and that has to come in short order.”

Indeed.

That’s the point here, and she’s finally spelling it out for everyone to hear–that Biden has to take action and that they have to have a plan that deals with this problem. That’s what the border cities have been demanding for two years, until it finally just became too much and they resorted to busing people to sanctuary cities.

Now, with just a few illegal aliens, the Democrats like Lightfoot are throwing a fit. It just shows what a sham the whole “we’re sanctuary cities” is. When push comes to shove, they show what a failure those policies are. But the Biden team has just been lying their heads off, claiming the border is secure and giving incompetent word salads. They’ve bought all this by their failed approach to the border.

Let's set the polemics aside, as best we can, and turn to the policy. Filter out the polemics, and Inside the Beltway's Steven Taylor is thinking along the proper lines.

Let me underscore that the main incentive for immigrants coming to the US is that they are seeking better lives for themselves and their families. And while we can debate the notion of sanctuary cities, the odds that such are primary drivers of migrant flows is rather absurd. Indeed, even mentioning them is just evidence of how all of this is red meat politics. The jobs migrants can get are the main incentive, and many of those jobs are in Texas and other Republican-controlled states (if that is the game that DeSantis wants to play). But, of course, the over-arching incentives are difficult to remove and the failure at setting a national policy to address the complexities of the issue is both long-standing and bipartisan (although so as to note that I am not just both-sidesing this, at least the Democrats aren’t trying to scapegoat and demonize immigrants).

Regardless, while there might some legitimate debate to be had concerning the burden of unauthorized immigration into the US on border states, the solution to such inequities should be addressed by the federal government via the federal legislature, not via stunts at the state level. This isn’t even Florida sending persons in Florida to other states, it is Florida sending persons in Texas to other states. It is absurd as any kind of policy or as an act of responsible governance.

We're so far, though, from being able to get anything done at the federal level, because posturing has more immediate payoffs.  There's a lot of work to do.

If you build a shining city on a hill, people will see it and attempt to come to it.

My stance has long been that it's unhappy people doing the migrating.  "The movement of people from places that suck to places that don't suck is one way to reduce global suckitude."

Thus, there's a reciprocal obligation on the people in the shining city, and on the people coming in.

I've long been of the view that there are Pareto improvements possible between immigrants and their new country.  "Give new arrivals an America to buy into, and an America that buys into the new arrivals, and we'll be OK."

Unfortunately, the way in which the federal government handles immigration turns even "playing by the rules" into a muddle.  For years, I had a front row seat for overseas graduate students dealing with student visa complications, and then the domestic content hassles that delayed, for years, the issuance of permanent resident visas let alone citizenship papers.  Like Mr McDermott, I have ancestors who showed up, sometimes with a letter of introduction for employment, sometimes with lots of kids in tow and very little money: that, though, was long enough ago that they were eligible to apply for citizenship within five years.  These days, the sense I get is that it's geologic time even to achieve permanent residency, after which the citizenship clock starts.  What effect that might have on the attitude of recently naturalized citizens toward immigration reforms that include a path toward citizenship I do not know.  (And this post has gotten too rambly already.)

That federal legislature Professor Taylor refers to, unfortunately, is too bogged down in polemical posturing ("Democrats want to import more welfare recipients."  "Do not.  Republicans want to import more cheap labor.") to get anything worthwhile done.  Is there no simpler way to work the problem?