Civics Lesson 101 & DACA

First of all, my heart truly goes out to the estimated 800,000 “Dreamers” who unfortunately are caught in the cross-hairs of a very important civics lesson for the large majority of the American population. Secondly, I AM NOT making a case for citizenship or deportation of these people. The American public must decide this at the polls, when you elect your representatives, which is the mechanism to find a solution to this problem.  I am however making a case for the need of the American public to understand how their government works. The reality is, this situation really does not have as much to do with this group of people, as it does with the structure and function of the republican form of government that our Founding Fathers established 228 years ago. And further than that, and more importantly, the fact that the majority of Americans do not even recognize the function and structure of government crisis that this situation is presenting to the people of this country.

The fact that I have seen too many television pundits, “Dreamers,” and even former President Obama make solely an emotional argument, stating how cruel President Trump’s action was, as opposed to a structure and function of government one, about why this group of people should be granted citizenship, only serves to make my point.  It is very easy to accept the emotional argument for this poor group of people, who by and large had absolutely nothing to do with being in this country as an illegal alien, undocumented immigrant, world citizen, or whatever politically correct terminology you so desire to use.  This is beside the point however.  The point actually is that emotions are not the relevant issue here.  The relevant issue here is the sovereign rule of law of a nation and how said nation has constructed its structure and function of government.

Our Founding Fathers were incredibly knowledgeable of world history and the rise and fall of great empires and nations.  They used said knowledge of antiquity like a buffet table.  They chose the desirable and good pieces of government and left the undesirable and bad pieces out.  In the end they created a brilliant system of government, with three distinct and separate branches: executive, legislative, and judicial, each with their own distinct and separate powers.  However, these three branches were also created to do a dance with each other in which each branch is purposefully and overtly watched by the other two to make sure that the people’s rights are protected, because this is the foremost purpose of government:  the protection of people’s rights.

These separate powers is the point of the civics lesson that our nation so desperately needs right now, including the television pundits, “Dreamers,” and sadly our former constitutional law professor and president, Barack Obama.  Bottom line, Article I, section 1 of the U.S. Constitution created the legislative power of our government when it states, “all legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States…”  The Constitution is very clear.  The law-making responsibility is solely vested in the legislative branch, not the executive.  The executive branch can however influence the lawmaking process because it can “recommend to their (Congress) consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.” (Article II, section 3).  The executive can make suggestions of policy and law, but the Constitution is incredibly clear on this distinction of who can actually make the bills that can be sent to the president in order to become laws.

Further, Congress possesses the sole power of dealing with immigration issues, not just because of their law-making powers, but also as specified in the Constitution in Article I, section 8, clause 4, where it states that the Congress has the power “to establish an uniform rule of naturalization.”

Now, here is where the problem is, and has been, the executive branch’s use of the executive order.  To dive deeper into this very real constitutional crisis, that has been an issue since George Washington’s administration, please read this fascinating and in depth research article from the Cato Institute that studies the executive orders of past presidents, along with the very serious lack of constitutional accountability from the legislative and judicial branches to keep the executive branch in check when it crosses the line into a legislative role. (https://www.cato.org/publications/congressional-testimony/impact-executive-orders-legislative-process-executive-lawmaking).

The bottom line is President Obama signed the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) in 2012 to protect these undocumented immigrants in our country because the U.S. Congress was not willing or able to create any legislation to his satisfaction that would grant amnesty to this incredibly large group of people.  Truthfully, the issue had already been settled because of the many naturalization and immigration laws that already existed in U.S. law at this point, so in all reality Congress did not have to do anything.  Again, there was no problem to solve because laws already existed which provided the solution to this situation.

This however was not satisfactory to President Obama, and instead of respecting the structure and function that exists in our government, allowing Congress to make the laws, he made an emotional argument to defend this group of people and very unconstitutionally created the DACA executive order to protect them.  To be clear, this action by the president was in fact legislation, which contradicted U.S. law, and further was not done with the legislative body, but in spite of their willingness or ability to do anything about it.  This was in fact an unconstitutional action by the president, which a few state’s attorney generals were beginning the process of challenging in federal courts, with the intent of getting the courts to use their power of judicial review to declare this executive order unconstitutional.

Now we fast forward to today and President Trump’s actions, which have caused such an uproar in our very ignorant and uninformed population on what George Washington called the Science of Government.  All President Trump did was to get rid of President Obama’s unconstitutional executive order so that the U.S. Congress, the only governmental mechanism capable of constitutionally dealing with it, could do so.  Therefore, if Congress passes a bill which protects this group of people the same way DACA did, and President Trump signs it into law, it would be protected constitutionally.  The only mechanism of getting rid of it at that point would be through a challenge to the federal court system, in which the Supreme Court could make the final and ultimate ruling on its constitutionality.  And that is how our government was designed to work.

The bottom line in this Civics Lesson 101 is that our Founding Fathers were very clear in their understanding of the importance of a proper Civics education of the American public.  They created a brilliant experiment, but unfortunately its success or failure depends on their posterity.  As George Washington stated, “A primary object should be the education of our youth in the science of government.  In a republic, what species of knowledge can be equally important?  And what duty more pressing than communicating it to those who are to be the future guardians of the liberties of the country?”  Each generation is responsible for transferring this very requisite knowledge down to the next, but sadly over the last couple of generations this is not taking place very well.  If it were, we would not even be having this debate in our country right now.

The ultimate fear of the Founding Fathers, written about over and over in the Federalist Papers, was of an American society to ignorant of the structure and function of the American government, which can and will create a direct line to tyranny and a dictator coming to power.  Emotional arguments about a group of people’s citizenship or deportation only clouds the Civics lesson that needs to be learned here by many Americans.  The process of granting this group of people citizenship, or deporting them back to their home country, is not the job of the president, be it Obama or Trump.  It is in fact the job of Congress.

Therefore, please just let them do their job here, and if you do not like their decision, VOTE!!  That is the biggest right of a citizen in a republican-democracy.  We are just over one year from the 2018 mid-term elections, and every member of the House of Representatives and one-third of the Senate will be up for reelection.  You, as American citizens, hold the power to keep them in office, or to place someone else there.  The power of the American government is in the hands of the people, as long as the people know how to wield said power and take advantage of it.  And to this end, this situation will be resolved the way the Founding Fathers designed it to be.

So, in conclusion, please stop whining about the processes of government when you do not understand how the government was created to work, and hopefully Congress will deal with this situation and find a reasonable solution for these 800,000 illegal immigrants in our country.

Fair-weather Fans are Shameful and Deplorable

I am not the biggest fan of outgoing President George W. Bush.  He attempted to change 219 years of American foreign policy precedent by pursuing preemptive war tactics, but I still considered him my president.  Furthermore, I still considered myself a proud American.   This noble idea is contrasted by the liberal left (exemplified by people like Alec Baldwin, Barbara Streisand, and Steve Earle who claimed they were going to leave the country because of President George W. Bush’s plans and ideologies) who went out of their way to demonize a well-intentioned president who was faced with the greatest tragedy of our nation’s history: the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, not even eight months into his term. 

 

President George W. Bush will probably go down as one of the worst five presidents our nation has ever had, even if Iraq turns into a democratic powerhouse in the theocratic Middle East, but he was still the American president, worthy of respect because he occupied the executive office.  Unfortunately, he did not receive this respect, and the majority of Americans turned on America because of him.

 

Now, I have had CNN and FOX news on in the background for the most of the last two days (tomorrow being inauguration day), and now all of the sudden everybody is proud of being an American?  Mary J. Blige, Faith Hill, Seal, Wil.I.Am, and Bono already have a new American anthem, which was performed on Oprah, and the new-found American pride is palpable.  I keep hearing the words “energy” and “inspiration,” which is great, but lest ye forget, it was only months ago that you were not proud of being an American. 

 

It is bad psychology to the rest of the world for the American people to pick and choose when they want to be an American.  You that did not consider yourselves proud Americans, or Americans at all, during the course of the last eight years, and now all of the sudden because of the election of the “untouchable” and “unchallengeable” Messiah-elect Barack Obama are proud Americans again, are the worst type of fan…the shameful and deplorable fair-weather fan. 

The New American Dream

The fundamental principles underpinning the idea of the American Dream are very slowly and quite dramatically being altered.  If I understand it correctly, the American Dream meant that if you worked hard, had good ethics and principles, were honest, and paid your taxes you could create something great here in the “land of immigrants.”  You could even create circumstances that would make the life of your children that much better, and on and on it goes.

 

To create and support my argument, I would like to use the field of education and the teacher/student relationship as my primary source, although this truly exemplifies a much larger and more important relationship, that of the adult to the child.  It was not that long ago when the student was the student, and the teacher was the teacher.  A teacher had respect, and the students, for the most part, were there to learn.  Education was a strongly valued part of the family and society, and the students/children were not catered to.  They received an education that worked in concert with, supported, reinforced even the principles of the American Dream, and it was this type of paradigm that created the Greatest Generation, a society or culture that had integrity, character, and knew what personal responsibility was. 

 

I do not feel the need to elaborate on the Gone with the Wind’s use of the word “damn” in 1939, or the CBS executives’ decision to shoot Elvis only from the waist up on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1957 (on his third and final appearance on the show), but the Greatest Generation was only some sixty years ago.  How far have we come in such a short time? 

 

I know what you are thinking at this point, “what a fuddy-dud,” but let me set the record straight.  I am a 34 year old libertarian making a simple observation.  I do not have any problem with the word “damn” or with Elvis the Pelvis, but come on.  Have you turned on the television, looked at the magazine racks in the grocery stores, or gotten on the internet lately? 

 

We have turned into such a selfish society, that we can only focus on our own selves and our worlds.  The sense of a common society or common good that should be protected has long been lost.  It is all about me, and the general welfare be damned!  The point is that through this transformation process, the social progressive slide, we have become a nation that caters to youth, dumbs down its education to teach to the lowest common denominator, and watches its business leaders commit unspeakable ethical violations that have defrauded or put in jeopardy the financial well-being of hundreds of thousands of families on differing levels.  Then we watch as the American Congress gives a $700 billion bailout package to the mortgage/insurance companies, because if they did not our economic infrastructure might absolutely collapse.  Now, the Big 3 American auto makers have their hands out as well, spending $20,000 a piece on their own lear jets to go to Congress to ask for billions of dollars.  What a joke.  What kind of message does this kind of unethical behavior send to our youth? Something substantially different from what the Greatest Generation sent to its youth, and it is the education system that supported both of these counter posing paradigms. 

 

The education system, over the years, has slowly decreased the rigor and expectations for the youth that will be the future.  Now, when a teacher catches a student cheating or plagiarizing he/she cannot give the guilty student a “0,” for fear of the parents going to the school board who might overturn that decision, taking away any remnant of authority and respect that the teacher had left.  What kind of message does that send?  It explicitly and outright tells the students that cheating is an accepted practice.  This type of situation would not have happened 60 years ago.  Then, if a parent was told his/her student had been caught cheating, the school’s punishment would have been the least of the student’s worries. 

 

So, over the last 60 years our education system has supported and reinforced either good work habits and ethical behavior or the polar opposite, and now I would like to make the last and final leap to the New American Dream.  You do not have to work hard.  You do not have to even follow the rules that exist to become a citizen of this country.  Just come on over, and we have now taken the righteous responsibility of helping everyone out, in spite of the Rule of Law.  You do not have to be honest, but do what you have to do, to get what you can get.  And if it does not work out, the mighty Big Brother, or Mother, American Government will bail you out.

 

The paradigm that has evolved has turned the original idea of the American Dream on its head.  Unfortunately, I fear that the mindset of the liberal left and the impoverished, underrepresented, and unfortunate members of our society, as represented by the African-American mother of two leaving one of Messiah Obama’s rallies claiming that she no longer has to worry about her mortgage or her gas bill, has become the reality.  Any reasonable, logical person knows that this woman is seriously confused, but that is not the point.  The point is the attitude of expectation without any expenditure has become the reality, and it has turned John F. Kennedy’s immortal words on their head, morphing them into: “ask not what you can do for your country, but what your country can do for you.” And that my friend is the fundamental change in what has now become the New American Dream.

 

The Language Barrier: Is English the Common Denominator

This post is a response to an article in the National Education Association’s journal, NEA Today.   Read the article at this link http://www.nea.org/home/29160.htm

 

I am a first year teacher with a M.Ed. from one of the top 5 schools of education in America.  I teach in a suburban high school in a southwestern state with an 80% Hispanic population, and a full 1/3 of the school’s population is on an ESL track (I have one class with a reading competency range from 4th grade to freshman in college).  The majority of the school population is well below the poverty line, and it is very transient.  This is the context from which my inquiry comes…
 
In your article you very unequivocally state as fact that today it still takes only three generations to lose a native language, but I would strongly disagree.  Fifty years ago our society did not enable immigrant populations to keep their native language like we do today.  It was okay for an immigrant group to have their “Chinatown,” “Little Italy,” or “Spanish Harlem,” but in order to assimilate into American culture English was the Common Denominator.  Today, I cannot go to an ATM machine or call into any company’s phone bank without being asked if the following transaction or conversation needs to take place in English or Spanish.  Today, our American, politically correct society is enabling the immigrant/non-English speaking population so strongly that they have absolutely no need to “lose their native language” in three generations, and so they will not.  Our nation is very quickly becoming a dual-lingual society, not a bi-lingual one. 
 
The trouble this enabling brings into my classroom…
My school’s population has a very strong gang influence, and although I have never felt like I was personally in danger (because my student’s respect me because I respect them), I am absolutely frustrated by the reality that my students, speaking Spanish, could be plotting something horrific towards me, another teacher, or the entire school, and I would not even know it.  And if this actually happened, could I be liable?  Seriously, ask yourself that.  I could never say “English only in my classroom,” without placing my job in jeopardy.   I do not speak Spanish, and before you cut me off, it is not my responsibility to accommodate to a language that is different from the Common Denominator language of our country.  The U.S. military has an English only rule for a reason, because our soldiers’ trust and safety in life and death situations depends on it.  Now, I am not suggesting that my line of work is as dangerous as a soldiers, but the underlying theme is the exact same.  It is an absolute safety issue, but our politically correct society will not look at that objective fact, because it might hurt a group of people’s feelings.  Well, boo freakin’ hoo.  I would not have the audacity to move to Nepal, Taiwan, or Munich, and expect to be catered to linguistically like the Hispanic population does here in America.  Why can’t people see this reality?  I truly do not understand.  
 
I know that you are thinking that I am some right-winged, conservative, build a 30 foot border to Mexico, and send them all back freak, but I am not at all.  I am the most independent and objective observer of the reality of our society.  I am actually jealous of people that are bi-lingual.  My language acquisition device is very weak, though I tried to learn Spanish in high school and in college.  My point is simply this, having a divided nation based upon language will be one of the primary reasons that our nation collapses.  My students do not have the skill levels in English to learn about the American government, so I must sacrifice, very begrudgingly so, the most important content one can get in a high school, in order to focus on basic skills?  In this reality either the “skills” or the “content” suffers.  What an asinine concept.  Our democracy only exists as long as the people understand they have the power and respect the system, and as soon as that power is forfeited because of sheer ignorance of our system of government, it will collapse (which is what happens when school districts across America prioritize “skills” over “content” even in the ignorant majority population…1/3 of graduating seniors need remediation in college already).  Then some tyrant or dictator could quite easily take all of our freedoms and liberties away. 
 
I fear the American future, because all of this is going on around us, and everyone is too scared or too sensitive to be politically incorrect, with the exception of a few of us.  It seems that the American scenario is very analogous to the “frog in the boiling water” situation.  If you take a frog and put him in a boiling pot of water, he will immediately jump out, but if you were to place that same from in a luke warm and very comfortable pot of water, and then proceeded to turn up the temperature slowly over a period of time, it would boil itself to death.  The point here is that we as a society are so sensitive to the proverbial trees, that we cannot see the forest, and will not be able to until the whole thing is burning down, because by then the smoke will be too thick to ignore.