President Obama at the Border
President Obama went to the border in El Paso on Tuesday and delivered a speech on immigration reform. He didn’t present a bill or issue any executive orders or set deadlines for action. Aides say his goal was to “create a pathway” and “a sense of urgency” to “move forward.” That is a start but not nearly enough.
The speech was right on its merits. The immigration system is a shambles. Millions live here outside the law. Visa policies are too restrictive, cruelly separating families and driving away talented university graduates to other countries. As Mr. Obama dryly noted, “We train them to create jobs for our competition.”
He said our current laws stifle opportunity for exactly the people for whom this economy needs to recover: entrepreneurs, students and low-wage workers. Illegality feeds “a massive underground economy that exploits a cheap source of labor,” Mr. Obama said. This isn’t fair to American workers, or to the undocumented — “the overwhelming majority” of whom, he said, “are just trying to earn a living and provide for their families.”
Mr. Obama was also right when he said that the country has heard “a lot of blame and a lot of politics and a lot of ugly rhetoric around immigration.” After listing the many ways his administration has “gone above and beyond” what Republicans had demanded as their price for reform — flooding the border with troops and technology to seal it tighter than ever — he noted that the Republicans were still not satisfied. “Maybe they’ll need a moat,” he joked. “Maybe they’ll want alligators in the moat.”
Mr. Obama’s description of the problem was accurate, and his prescription the right one: a “good-faith effort” by both parties to pass comprehensive measures that combine border security with assimilation, not mass expulsion, for illegal immigrants who qualify.
To move things forward, Mr. Obama will have to do a lot more. He needs to outline legislation, push Congressional leaders — including those in his own party — to back it and make the case repeatedly to Americans.
The president also needs to get his own policies in order. For all his talk of supporting the hopes of the undocumented, his administration has been doubling down on the failed strategy of mass expulsion. It is pressing state and local police to join in an ill-conceived program called Secure Communities, which sends arrested people’s fingerprints through federal immigration databases, turning all local officers and jails into arms of the Department of Homeland Security.
Many lawmakers and police agencies say it erodes public safety by making immigrants, especially victims of domestic violence, afraid to report crimes. They worry about giving rogue officers a convenient tool for racial profiling. And they feel betrayed because what the administration once billed as a transparent, voluntary program aimed only at dangerous convicted criminals turns out to be none of those things. The Homeland Security Department’s own data show that more than half of those deported under the program have no criminal records or committed only minor crimes.
Mr. Obama and the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, should heed the growing calls by lawmakers in California, Illinois, New York and other places to abandon Secure Communities to preserve public safety.
As for the broader issue of immigration reform, Mr. Obama’s aides insisted on Tuesday that he did, indeed, have a plan that interested Americans could read on the White House Web site. If Mr. Obama is really committed to this issue it’s going to take a lot more than that.
Republican Demands and the Debt Limit
Even before the White House and the Republicans began talks on the debt limit, John Boehner made clear that he was looking for a political fight, not a compromise.
Then, in a speech on Monday, the speaker of the House said that Republicans would insist on trillions of dollars in spending cuts in exchange for votes to raise the debt limit. He did not mention a time frame, but even a fraction of “trillions” in the near term could do huge damage to the recovery. He also did not offer specifics on how he planned to make those cuts. After the beating Republicans took for their plan to slash Medicare, he clearly decided generalities were politically safer.
There is no way to solve the country’s fiscal ills without an accurate diagnosis and rigorous prescriptions for a cure. Mr. Boehner’s speech was devoid of both.
Among the “obstacles” to economic success he cited, he never mentioned the recession or the financial crisis, both Bush-era creations. Rather, he blamed Obama-era stimulus spending for harming the economy and job growth. Never mind that the Congressional Budget Office found that the stimulus staved off an even deeper disaster.
Mr. Boehner charged that President Obama’s policies have “crowded out” the private sector and “increased uncertainty” for “job creators.” That makes no economic sense. If the government were competing with business, interest rates would be on the rise, not at rock bottom. If employers were uncertain about making new hires, they would get work done by increasing the hours of current employees. The average workweek is stuck around 34 hours, indicating a lack of work, not uncertainty.
Mr. Boehner can’t admit all that because private-sector slack and a dearth of jobs call for more federal aid, not less. And he is bent on less — far less — no matter the true state of the economy.
The president and his aides will have to do some deft negotiating, and politicking, to secure a timely increase in the debt limit, while rebutting Mr. Boehner’s wrongheaded ideas. They should begin by setting new terms of the debate, explaining that the nation’s serious fiscal problems require thoughtful solutions — with spending cuts and tax increases and with both sides giving to get.
Haiti’s Continuing Cholera Outbreak
A United Nations report on the cholera outbreak that has sickened 300,000 Haitians since last fall, killing nearly 5,000, finds evidence to suggest that the disease may have originated at a United Nations military camp north of the capital, which spilled raw sewage into a tributary of the Artibonite River. The epidemic was able to spread so far only because of the chronic and horrible deficiencies in Haiti’s sanitation and health care systems, which long predate the 2010 earthquake.
The fact that the disease is still spreading is a reminder of how much more help Haiti needs and the consequences of continued neglect.
Technically, the challenge of containing the epidemic is simple enough. Haitians need clean water for drinking and washing. They need soap and bleach and access to medical care for rehydration when they fall ill. They need safe ways to dispose of sewage and shelter for when the rains worsen and cause streets and rivers to flood and cholera cases to spike.
For too many, the ingredients of tragedy remain stubbornly in place. Even as relief agencies are winding down their presence in Haiti, about 680,000 people are still living in camps and waiting for permanent shelter. Life in this setting is precarious, without adequate access to latrines and safe drinking water.
The United Nations’ overall appeal to respond to the epidemic, for $175 million, is 48 percent financed. Haiti’s continuing health emergency may have been overlooked in a crush of world events, but while the sick and dying are waiting for the world to respond, the disease is not.
Even for Gov. Christie, This One’s a Stretch
Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey prides himself on his bluster and relishes the attention it garners in conservative circles beyond the state. He jumped the shark last month, suggesting he might defy the State Supreme Court if it orders him to make up a $1.6 billion shortfall of education financing that disproportionately punishes poorer districts and their students.
“In all seriousness, governor, what if the ruling comes down and they say ‘you’ve got to spend’ ” the money, “and you just say no”? asked Eric Scott, a radio host. The governor replied, “Well, that’s an option, too.” He added, “Have I thought about that? Of course I have.” Last week, New Jersey’s attorney general, Paula Dow, also refused to rule out the option.
Political theater is never a substitute for responsible leadership. Gleefully threatening to defy the rule of law — the law he vowed to uphold as governor — is inexcusable. As a former United States attorney, one would think that Mr. Christie would get that. If he defied the court, he could be disbarred as a lawyer, held in contempt or impeached.
The comments are part of Governor Christie’s wider campaign against the state court and what he calls its activism. That is a code word for his disapproval of the court’s record of enforcing the New Jersey Constitution to mandate education reform, affordable housing and other solutions to serious problems.
In this case, the court’s role has been particularly modest. In 2009, after decades of litigation, it accepted a state proposal on how to improve the quality and fairness of the education system. The executive branch under former Gov. Jon Corzine set the education standards and decided how much money is needed to give each student the chance to meet them. The court’s role now is to assess whether, by those measures, current financing is adequate. In March, Special Master Peter Doyne judged that it is not. He found that education cuts “fell more heavily upon our high-risk districts” and “at-risk students.”
If the New Jersey Supreme Court calls for the state to finance education at the level required by its own formula, Mr. Christie will have to comply — unless he wants to defy the rule of law and the American system of government.
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