This week I’ll be doing some travelling, starting on Wednesday. I’ll go up to TN to see my mom and sister, then on up to IL and WI to see some leaves change and hang with my cousins, before visiting mom again on the way back home.
But I’ve been noodling around with many column ideas for a while, so I’m hoping to post columns on Wednesday and Friday, and I’ll play it by ear for next Monday.
Today, as Trump appears to be on the verge of shepherding a peace deal in the Middle East that would earn him universal acclaim – even on the left, if he weren’t so orange and trumpy – I’m going to talk about his other greatest accomplishment (IMHO): his success at stopping illegal immigration and deporting the illegals who are already here.
I want to focus on one specific aspect of that struggle, which is the ideological arrogance of some of those who have come here illegally, especially those from Mexico.
I’ll be the first to acknowledge that many Mexicans came here for a very logical reason, which is to escape the poverty and chaos of their badly run homeland in favor of the opportunities to improve their lives and future in America. That is a worthy goal, and I don’t blame anybody who wants to achieve it.
Don’t get me wrong: if they came illegally, they’ve still got to go back. If they voluntarily self-deport, they can have a chance to be heavily vetted, and to someday potentially immigrate legally. (If they don’t, and they force us to catch and deport them, don’t let the door flatten your sombrero on your way out.)
But I’m not talking about those Mexicans. I’m talking about the ones who have adopted an obnoxious and false leftist ideological fantasy that much of the United States morally and legally belongs to them. This belief has been part of the lefty/multicultural/anti-colonizing ascendency in academia generally, and Hispanic and American studies in particular. (Common terms are the “All of Mexico” movement, and the “Reconquista.”)
The theory is that much of the southern and western United States once belonged to Mexico, and since taking land by political conquest is immoral and illegitimate (at least when Europeans or white folks do it), a big chunk of the USA is not really “America,” and Mexicans have a right to be here and stay here. And maybe be given the land back officially, just as some argue that black Americans should get cash reparations or else property, in a variation on the “40 acres and a mule” formula.
As a former academic, I encountered later iterations of this aggressively misinformed concept in the form of “land acknowledgements,” those fatuous pronouncements preceding various events (graduations, conferences, etc.) bemoaning the fact that the event is taking place on land once owned by various Edenic, noble (non-white) peoples such as the Hekawi tribe or the Wakandans, from whom it was brutally stolen by Euro-whities. (Boo, whitey! Boo!)
Basically, the conceit is that the imaginary Elizabeth Warrens – brown gals with long black hair in braids, deer skin dresses, and cheekbones you could skin a Tatanka with – were all dispossessed by the actual Elizabeth Warrens – translucent AWFL shrews whiter than a yodeling competition in Reykjavik in January. (#wemustneverstopmockingher)
Phony land acknowledgments were the highest form of virtue signaling, making the scolding whiners feel morally superior while costing them nothing. (If they believed their own BS, they’d cancel the event, insist that the venue be given to the descendants of the Apaches or whoever, and abandon their own houses immediately.)
This ideological stance only added to the larger trend of resistance to assimilation, which has made the recent explosion in illegal immigration so much more destructive than earlier waves of immigrants. And this is obviously a significant problem with at least a large portion of Mexican illegals – and their pale-face lefty enablers – judging from the violent protests and attacks on ICE this year, including those involving flying Mexican flags and burning the American one.
Needless to say, believers in those ideas vigorously oppose any suggestion that they should assimilate to American culture! To the contrary, they are entitled to claim the land for themselves, after which we can be required to assimilate to their culture, if they allow us to stay.
So let’s take a little stroll down history lane, and see how well this theory holds up.
Spain started controlling parts of the Americas in 1493, and started planting cities and missions in what is now the USA in 1565 (starting with St. Augustine). Their control of parts of America lasted for almost 3 centuries, until they started weakening in the 19th century. They lost Louisiana to the French in 1803; they ceded Florida to the US in 1819. And then they lost the rest to Mexico in the Mexican War of Independence in 1821, who then lost it to America in the Mexican-American War of 1846-48.
So to the extent that most of the disputed Western territories that eventually became the site of the “Reconquista” political fight today (CA, AZ, NM, etc.) were “owned” by any nation, they were owned by Spain for 250 years, then by Mexico for 25 years, and then by the USA for the last 175 years.
Which means that the La Raza rioters say that big chunks of the US belong to them because Mexico controlled it for only 25 of the last 450 years! Needless to say, they don’t talk a lot about how the Mexicans “stole” it from the Spaniards before America “stole” it from them!
Because after all, the Mexicans won their land fair and square, in a war, whereas the grifter gringos won it from the Mexicans…um…fair and square…in a war. (What’s Spanish for “D’oh!”?)
And their case is even weaker when seen in the light of the racialist identity politics of most “educated” young lefties. Because from what I’ve read, Mexico has a much more stubbornly persistent racially binary, privileged/under-privileged make-up than the multi-racial USA does.
A disproportionate number of the most influential/rich/politically connected Mexicans descend pretty clearly from the Spaniards who ruled Mexico for most of its history. The descendants of Aztecs – shorter and more squat, with darker skin and flatter features – are easily distinguishable from the taller, lighter-skinned European Spaniards.
And those guys were European colonizers to the core, and would be considered white in modern leftists’ racial taxonomy.
But before you award the Nobel Prize for Victimology to the “native” Mexicans, hold on to your maracas. Because if we canoe back a little farther into the mists of history, we find that those “native” Mexicans were actually the racial descendants of the Aztecs, who were very successful colonizers in their own right.
In fact, Cortes’ conquest of the Aztecs was made possible in part by brutal Aztec treatment of their neighboring tribes, which motivated those tribes to take revenge on them by giving the Spaniards assistance and local knowledge.
Now I don’t believe in all of this racialized identity politics that the professional/academic left does. I’m more of a conservative, merit-based/MLK guy, into judging people by the content of their character instead of the color of their skin. But if I did buy into the racialist left’s taxonomy, I STILL wouldn’t think that the Mexican protestors should be fighting ICE and Americans.
To the extent that they are Aztec-descended, they should be pissed at the Spanish (i.e. “white”) power structure that’s been keeping them down in Mexico. To the extent that they are Spanish/white, they should mock the Aztec-descended Mexicans, because they are condemning the Spanish for colonizing them, while the Aztecs only had “Mexico” because THEY had colonized/genocided the previous inhabitants.
And to the extent that they are proud Mexican patriots/nationalists who don’t care about racial differences amongst them – and good for them! – they should be ashamed of themselves for whining that the Yankees “stole” Mexico from them 175 years ago, when THEY had stolen it from the Spanish 25 years earlier. Just like they should feel sheepish because they resent being forced to speak English, when they only speak Spanish because a bunch of white Europeans forced it on them, and wiped out the native Nahuatl language.
However it would be fun, if they did manage to drive out the Americans and take over LA, to hack their phone systems with messages that started, “For Nahuatl, press one…” And then they could suffer when some Aztec jerk who calls himself whatever is Nahuatl for “Bad Bunny” gives them four months to learn Nahuatl before he yowls out some terrible music at halftime of the Super Bowl of soccer. (Making a horrific experience even worse!)
Illegal aliens’ fantasies of forcing American citizens to adapt to their own cultural norms is just one more reason to deport them. Unlike earlier immigrants who admired America and were excited and eager to become Americans – like my Scots-Irish and German ancestors, and my wife’s Norwegian and British ones – too many illegals prefer their home cultures, and would rather create outposts of El Salvador or Somalia here, or live in Muslim enclaves with sharia law here.
That is certainly not true of all immigrants, and I’m sure there are many Muslims who want to get out from under the jihadi freaks running their nations, and many Central Americans who want to escape the d-bags who have turned their countries into an oppressive hell-holes, and many others who just want to work hard and become patriotic Americans.
However, thanks to Joe Biden, many Democrats and some Republicans, we’ve got a huge mess on our hands now, and we got here by allowing millions of unvetted illegals to flout our laws. But as the Secretary of War once said, “That sh*t is over!”
It’s going to be hard to devote a lot of time and resources to processing more would-be immigrants while we’re spending a fortune to deport the millions of illegals here now. (Again, thank Joe Biden for that!)
When we do get back to vetting new immigrants, we’d better vet the hell out of them! Because along with all of the good ones hoping to come for the same reason most of our ancestors came – before there was a welfare system or any social safety net, and you were expected to assimilate to American culture, instead of the other way around – there are many who want to come for the welfare benefits, and the chance to spread their own hatred of the West and American culture.
And we’ve already got enough leftists, thank you.
Hamas and Trantifa delenda est!
Martin Simpson 