Illegal immigration is a contentious issue, but does disagreeing with Obama administration policy make a conservative blog a threat to national security? Civil Candor has had nine visits from the Homeland Security domain since Latin America and Obama Fight Alabama’s Immigration Law was posted on Sunday. Are Homeland Security’s visits to Civil Candor a coincidence, just more interested readers? It seems unlikely that DHS employees spend their lunch breaks reading conservative blogs.
Since 2009, talk has circulated of a Homeland Security memo discussing right wing extremism on the web and elsewhere. Defining extremism requires a starting point. Democratic policy since Barack Obama took office has created such an enormous gap between Washington and conservative America that unfavorable responses to administration policy must appear extreme to those who support the president and Democrats in Congress.
The president is facing mounting criticism for not doing enough to fulfill promises to pass an immigration bill, or at least a federal DREAM Act. States like Illinois and California have taken matters into their own hands, passing state level DREAM Acts using private funding. Other states, like Alabama and Arizona, have decided that federal enforcement efforts are not fixing their problems, and have ventured in the opposite direction. Repeatedly telling Americans that the administration’s vision for immigration reform is a good thing, and vital if our country is to prosper again, will not make them believe it. There has been plenty of negative PR from the legal actions taken against Alabama and Arizona, but does this mean that opposing viewpoints should be considered threatening?
America needs to have some minimal measure of faith in a government that bickered over the debt ceiling for weeks before the nation’s credit was finally downgraded. Suing a state for taking enforcement actions that many Americans agree with, while allowing other states to pass laws that encourage illegal immigrants to stay, will not restore that faith.
There will never be change without dissent, and if weeks of debt ceiling acrimony proved one thing, it is how badly we need change in Washington. Demonizing dissent, such as blaming the Tea Party for America’s credit downgrade, stifles the discussion we need to drag our country out of a hole that gets deeper by the moment. For conservative bloggers contributing to the national discussion, check your visitor logs. Your words may be expanding your readership in ways that will surprise you.
It seems that the Department of Homeland Security’s time would be better spent taking care of the illegal immigration problem than reading conservative blogs. What are they looking for? There are thousands of illegals breaking our laws every day. The DHS is not doing much to stop the border crossing of illegals, many of whom are criminals, drug dealers or possibly terrorists. It looks like the administration feels more threatened by its own citizens than illegals. Of course illegals, when made citizens are a vote, whereas the person writing a conservative article certainly will not be voting for this administration.