* “This discussion is veering into pure nativism.”
Yes. Because that’s where the higher grade ore is found. Maybe it will never be needed. But when a society appears to navigate by the stars of a cultural narrative formed only years before and transmitted through cinema and popular fiction, it is best to have a bit of leverage wedded to bedrock as a fallback.
* We need solidarity between nativists in different countries, because the pro mass immigrationists work as a trans-national team, we need do to the same.
* “Legal immigration is good if you are OK with the democratic process. “
But notice, we don’t seem to have a democratic process when it comes to immigration. That’s one of the issues that makes people mad. Democracy for me, but not for thee seems to be he word of the day. How are all those judges ruling from the bench doing with this concept of “democracy”?
* Some of Trump’s appeal is undoubtedly due to a segment of the right deciding, in effect, to embrace the idea of a “living Constitution” in order to push conservative policies. I doubt Trump understands this, but I suspect a great number of his supporters are thinking, “well, heck, if the Constitution just means whatever the Dear Leader says it means (as expressed through the government’s countless departments and ministries), why not have a Dear Leader who merely directs the state to read OUR favored policies into the text?”
* Excuse me but part of the democratic process is being able to make your case to the public without shaming words like “nativism” being thrown around. Opponents of mass immigration have every right to try to convince their fellow Americans that even legal immigration should be kept to a minimum. Most immigration, legal or illegal, is simply a tool of class warfare.
“Nativists” must make the case that politicians taking care of their citizen’s interests first is exactly analogous to parents looking after the interests of their own children before those of children in the Congo, for example.
* Accepting immigrants from Europe made sense for America at the time. It still might make sense for us to accept a few more, but only a few. It would have made no sense for us to have accepted immigrants from most other places then or now.
* America is a nation of immigrants – white immigrants. They shaped and defined the character of the nation. It’s European in terms of laws, civic structure, language, and religion. If any people can be said to have a collective right to anything, the founding stock of America have a right to keep their country as it is. The alternative that’s being foisted on them is not a nation of any kind, but a hotch-potch of different races (in perpetual flux due to continuing immigration) elbowing each other at the ethnic spoils trough.
* Steve,
Not long ago you gave of us a sample of market-tested immigration phrases, such as “smart immigration,” if I recall correctly.
I think this stuff does make a difference, if it can be absorbed into the culture. And I do detect on the comments section of Breitbart and other places the arguments being put forward on VDARE and here. Douglas Rushkoff, in Media Virus, makes a compelling case that AIDS activists were able get the early release of life-saving drugs by using phrases such as “smart drugs” to change peoples attitudes towards experimental drugs.
It seems that it would be helpful if there was a patriotic Jourolist (Buchanan, Brimelow, Derbyshire, Sailer, Coulter, etc), who coordinated with well-known but closeted journalists, academics, campaign consultants, and congressional staffers and sent out weekly phrases, arguments, and articles.
Some may say that blogs serve that purpose, but I think many of us are ghettoized into reading the same few blogs we agree with, and the arguments put forward are helpful but largely inchoate.
Watching Trump quickly come back into the fold regarding H1-B visas shows the power of arguments and pressure, and Breitbart’s interview with Trump yesterday showed lines of argument developed elsewhere.
