Althouse: "Despite his endorsement of the DREAM Act, President Obama has deported more illegal immigrants than any president in history."

July 8, 2012

"Despite his endorsement of the DREAM Act, President Obama has deported more illegal immigrants than any president in history."

"He's been deporting about 400,000 people a year, about double the number in the George W. Bush administration."

From a list of "Obama's Accomplishments." (Sarcasm intended.)

65 comments:

Andy said...: This is one of the reasons I might stay home this November.; 7/8/12, 10:12 AM
Paddy O said...: Reminds me of the advice Robert the Bruce's father gave in Braveheart:

"You will embrace this rebellion. Support it from our lands in the north. I will gain English favor by condemning it and ordering opposed from our lands in the south."; 7/8/12, 10:16 AM
chickelit said...: Billboard spotted in LA with GWB's smiling face: Deseo para mí todavía?; 7/8/12, 10:19 AM
Alex said...: Andy - you really are a treasonous little shit.; 7/8/12, 10:21 AM
edutcher said...: Now there's an opportunity to go after the Hispanic vote (except that DREAM doesn't seem to be all that popular among those Hispanics with a legal franchise).

Andy R. said...

This is one of the reasons I might stay home this November.

Promise?; 7/8/12, 10:23 AM
Bender said...: Why a pro-Romney PAC isn't running Spanish-language ads highlighting that Obama is bragging about deporting so many people is beyond me.; 7/8/12, 10:24 AM
Andy said...: This is also one of the areas where conservatives tend to get it the most wrong with accusations that Obama is trying to create some paradise for illegal immigrants.

I never saw any acknowledgement that Obama has been twice as punitive as Bush. I hope Obama is only doing it to try to get re-elected, since there is a certain segment of the American population that appreciates mistreating latinos.; 7/8/12, 10:26 AM
Palladian said...: since there is a certain segment of the American population that appreciates mistreating latinos.

My Dominican ex-boyfriend used to like to be spanked. Is that what you mean?; 7/8/12, 10:28 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: "He's been deporting about 400,000 people a year, about double the number in the George W. Bush administration."

And liberals haven't gone ballistic as they did on Georgie Boy.

It's, like, hypocrisy squared.,...; 7/8/12, 10:28 AM
edutcher said...: Andy R. said...

This is also one of the areas where conservatives tend to get it the most wrong with accusations that Obama is trying to create some paradise for illegal immigrants.

I never saw any acknowledgement that Obama has been twice as punitive as Bush. I hope Obama is only doing it to try to get re-elected, since there is a certain segment of the American population that appreciates mistreating latinos.

Hatman hasn't been paying attention, as usual.

There's been plenty made of it - along with Zero's other "accomplishments."

And it's not mistreatment - it's enforcing the law, although it's easy to see how Hatman could get confused.

PS for somebody who loves the illegals as much as Hatman, you'd think he'd know it's, "Latino", always with an upper case ell.; 7/8/12, 10:30 AM
Paddy O said...: "since there is a certain segment of the American population that appreciates mistreating latinos."

Given the history of Latin America, the segment most responsible for the mistreatment of latinos is other latinos. Creating a system that encourages illegal emigration is committing massive violence against people who really are generally good and seeking the best for their families.; 7/8/12, 10:32 AM
Palladian said...: And liberals haven't gone ballistic as they did on Georgie Boy.

Everything that so-called liberals claim to care about, and their vociferous and constant complaints throughout the previous administration, basically vanished when Obama took office. The reason for that is that they don't actually care about anything except power.

This is, of course, not a trait unique to so-called liberals, but they're the most comically conspicuous example of the phenomenon.; 7/8/12, 10:33 AM
Palladian said...: It's amusing that people here pretend that Andy R. is presenting a good-faith argument, or that he has any sort of argument to present at all. He's simply being a reactionary. The reactionary impulse is one of the reasons so-called liberals became so-called.; 7/8/12, 10:37 AM
Matt Sablan said...: This is another area, like security and overseas drone killings, that a Republican president could never accomplish without all hell breaking loose from the media. It's great to know that, behind it all, he realizes it is a problem.; 7/8/12, 10:46 AM
edutcher said...: No, dear, we're just savoring the irony.

(apparently, it's another chromosome missing from Lefties); 7/8/12, 10:48 AM
bagoh20 said...: The Romney campaign has so much low hanging fruit to tear into that this election should be a landslide. Even if you are completely nonpartisan, the level of Presidential dishonesty and failure to keep promises is unprecedented, and the easy campaign ads only need clips of Obama talking compared to the facts. Independents will be blown right over the right side of that fence stuck in their ass.

Romney has changed positions, but that's defensible, but Obama refuses to admit his mistakes and they are so blatant you can't even call most of the mistakes. The message is simple:

"He lied to you about almost everything. Will you reward him, by falling for it again? Do you want the opposite of what he's promising...again?; 7/8/12, 10:51 AM
Palladian said...: What's wrong with y'all? Have you changed into Democrats? Isn't deportation what you WANT?

No, honey, what we want is our laws to be enforced, and, ideally, not to be broken in the first place.

I know it's difficult for a leftist to understand, but not everyone gets a psycho-sexual, sadistic thrill out of the use of State power over other people.; 7/8/12, 10:53 AM
Anonymous said...: Please define deported. Does that include folks caught crossing the bored run Arizona or California and shipped back on the next bus?; 7/8/12, 10:55 AM
Matt Sablan said...: Leslyn: Well, to start with, the White House could return Arizona's calls instead of ordering its people to not cooperate with the part of the law the Supreme Court upheld.; 7/8/12, 11:03 AM
bagoh20 said...: "What's wrong with y'all? Have you changed into Democrats? Isn't deportation what you WANT?"

Yes, and he should be going after independents with the truth instead of Latinos with lies. That's the point.

The real question is why will you vote for someone who deports so many, and then lies to you about it for your vote? Suckers.; 7/8/12, 11:04 AM
Hagar said...: What is needed is that we set all the other Democrats down and get them to admit that the word illegal means illegal.
Then we gan begin discussing what to do about all those who are already here.
And no, most of them are not going to "go back where they came from." That just is not going to happen.; 7/8/12, 11:09 AM
edutcher said...: leslyn said...

edutcher,

PS for somebody who loves the illegals as much as Hatman, you'd think he'd know it's, "Latino", always with an upper case ell.

No doubt you're right. But since you're concerned that the language be used properly, why not "Hispanic?" "Latino" leaves out half the Hispanic population.

Tell Hatman.; 7/8/12, 11:17 AM
rcocean said...: Yeah its terrible when the President follows his oath of office and enforces -albeit feebly - the law.; 7/8/12, 11:36 AM
rcocean said...: BTW, it amazes me how open the left is in their hatred of the USA. Wall Street wants open borders because of $$$, the left simply hates the country.; 7/8/12, 11:38 AM
cubanbob said...: Obama and the democrat's economy is resulting in more illegals leaving than deportation. Four more years of Obama and the democrats and a lot of American's might start considering self-deportation.; 7/8/12, 11:43 AM
test said...: "since there is a certain segment of the American population that appreciates mistreating latinos."

The key takeaway is not that Andy believes the best contribition he is capable of making to society is trying to piss off a few people on the right. The key takaway is that he's correct.; 7/8/12, 11:46 AM
Chip S. said...: leslyn, if you're going to be pedantic, you should try to be correct. And the LA Times says you're wrong.; 7/8/12, 11:50 AM
Scott said...: I never saw any acknowledgement that Obama has been twice as punitive as Bush. I hope Obama is only doing it to try to get re-elected, since there is a certain segment of the American population that appreciates mistreating latinos.

This is what sucks about progressivism. Pander to group A, abuse group B, bomb country C, whatever it takes to get progressive D elected.

In other words, it's not about doing what's right so much as it is about attaining power. That kind of fluid morality to achieve political ends is the main reason why progressivism sucks.

One thing you can say about conservatives: They kick out their corrupt pols lighning fast. Progressives, by contrast, hang on to them and brazenly declare that their shit don't stink all that much -- at least until it appears that it affects their re-electability (and then they take them out back and knife them politically).

To a progressive, the end justifies the means. And if conservatives garner derision by Alinskyists for championing high standards -- well, there are some battles that are better to lose.

Integrity is important to a conservative, but not so much to a progressive. That's why a progressive can openly wish that they "hope Obama is only doing it to try to get re-elected;" but a conservative could never utter something like that.

Every revolution in history was a popular uprising against corruption. Progressives should remember this the next time they pander for political gain.; 7/8/12, 11:50 AM
Chip S. said...: I never saw any acknowledgement that Obama has been twice as punitive as Bush.

Perhaps that's b/c it's not true.

Unless you click through to the Pew study cited by Boaz in his totally misleading HuffPo piece, you may be unaware of the fact that his comparison of the Bush 8-year average to Obama's two years (2009 and 2010) completely masks the fact that there was a huge upward trend in the number of deportations that started in 2003, peaked in 2009, and declined in 2010.; 7/8/12, 11:57 AM
Cedarford said...: Consider that Bush was a corporate Open Borders fan.
While he was strutting about as the "New American Churchill" saving America from hostile foreign Evildoers and out saving the Noble Freedom Lovers of the Religion of Peace....
Not only was he oblivious to the economic catastrophy building..
He was DELIBERATELY oblivious to the video footage showing hordes of illegals pouring across the US Border with no clue on who they were..

The people wanting "all those jobs lying about Americans won't do now that employers cut construction and slaughterhouse pay down to 7.00 an hour from 15 an hour" Bush claimed.
When people screamed "what about not just Hezbollah and Somalis pouring in?" Bush refused comment because his corporate donors wanted Open Borders.
When Border States screamed about downs and hospitals going bankrupt on illegals and the crime problem and displacement of US lower working class whites and blacks from whole industries - Bush and his corporatists were silent.

It was easy for Obama to improve on Bush's record. He had nowhere to go but up.
And it helped that the dire Bush-Obama economic bungling has made the US less attractive to all but the most unskilled, parasitic illegals from countries like Haiti and Somalia.
(Which Obama still wants in in the millions); 7/8/12, 12:06 PM
John said...: The person who counted the number of deportations... is this the same person who counts the number of unemployed?; 7/8/12, 12:09 PM
Lyle said...: This policy ironically makes sense for the Democratic party because illegals hurt the wage prospects of a lot of American workers and you can't socialize programs and then have them undermined by thousands of undocumented workers who get the social stuff from fake documentation.

At Andy R.

Deporting Latinos back to Latin America is not mistreating them. All you're government is doing is sending them back to their country of origin. Latin America is great place to be isn't it?; 7/8/12, 12:10 PM
Chip S. said...: So will you chastise anyone who uses "African-American" for being out of step with the Congressional Black Caucus?; 7/8/12, 12:36 PM
Paco Wové said...: ""Latino" leaves out half the Hispanic population."

Which half would that be?; 7/8/12, 12:37 PM
JAL said...: @ leslyn What's wrong with y'all? Have you changed into Democrats? Isn't deportation what you WANT?

It's spelled like this: h y p o c r i s y ²; 7/8/12, 12:54 PM
Humperdink said...: 400,000 deportations? Count me as skeptical. I suspect it's the same 2 illegal immigrants, 200,000 times.; 7/8/12, 12:57 PM
Bayoneteer said...: When Obama's deport numbers go to the seven figures (per annum) let us know.; 7/8/12, 1:07 PM
Dante said...: Andy Sez:
This is also one of the areas where conservatives tend to get it the most wrong with accusations that Obama is trying to create some paradise for illegal immigrants.

I thought Obama was more into how people "perceive" reality. So on the one hand he deports illegals, presumably in response to the high unemployment rate, but on the other hand cracks down on AZ and others, trying to make them seem like the bad guys.; 7/8/12, 1:07 PM
Terrye said...: The only reason Obama has deported more than Bush is that during the last few years of Bush's tenure the whole system was expanded.

There were more detention centers built and more border agents put on duty. More courts, more ICE...more everything.

That lead to a big increase in deportations during the last couple of years Bush was in office and that trend has continued.

Obama talks a lot about what he inherited..well he inherited a more robust deportation system than Bush did.; 7/8/12, 1:25 PM
Anonymous said...: Blogger leslyn said...

Paco Wove':

Latinas. But if you live in the western US you might well disagree with me.
________________________________

The problem is not with Latinos or Hispanics,it's with Mexicans.; 7/8/12, 1:27 PM
jeff said...: "So this factoid is reported with sarcasm, and it's hypocrisy squared--what's more hypocritical than complaining about getting what you WANT?"

Who did you see complaining? Other than the hatkid and it wasn't about something he wanted.; 7/8/12, 2:01 PM
Palladian said...: Touched a nerve, did I?; 7/8/12, 2:06 PM
Michael said...: Garage. The reason conservatives know so much about liberals is that most of us were when we were young and misinformed. We happen to have changed our views as we learned that many of our beliefs were not working in the real world. There are fewer liberals who have jumped the fence the other direction but they can be recognized because they are more articulate and can be seen often as reasonable people who can engage in rationale discussion and are not reliant on babble.; 7/8/12, 2:20 PM
edutcher said...: Palladian said...
Touched a nerve, did I?

Didn't we!

PS I suppose Hatman doesn't like it when I call him "genius", either.

Chip S. said...

leslyn, if you're going to be pedantic, you should try to be correct. And the LA Times says you're wrong.

FWIW (just this side of zero), I've heard them used interchangeably for the last 30 years or so. Latino seems to be more passe BTW, everybody now is Hispanic, although I think the LA Times gets it wrong (surprise!).

How is Latino an ethnic group and Hispanic not? Both are merely linguistic-heritage designations. People in the category speak, or had in their ancestry, people who spoke Spanish as a first language and lived in the Western Hemisphere - and that's all. There aren't any kind of cultural or racial characteristics common to the group as a whole.; 7/8/12, 2:29 PM
garage mahal said...: Touched a nerve, did I?

No, as I said, it's the same damn post every thread. Also, you seem to have this idea that you're the One True Liberal Oracle who must speak for all other liberals. It's just weirdly authoritarian.; 7/8/12, 2:33 PM
Paco Wové said...: "There aren't any kind of cultural or racial characteristics common to the group as a whole."

There isn't even a language common to the group as a whole, either. Where do the poor Brazilians fit in? And I've known "Hispanics/Latin(o|a)s" who didn't speak anything but English.; 7/8/12, 2:36 PM
Paco Wové said...: But "Hispanic/Latino/etc" is no worse in this regard than "Asian-American". Both cram a huge, highly varied swathe of humanity into the same bland bureaucratic pigeonhole.; 7/8/12, 2:38 PM
ampersand said...: Hispanic,Chicano,Latino,all euphemisms used by white people who think calling people by their national origin is some sort of
perjorative. Little old ladies still call such people Spanish,so as not to offend.
Calling people ,Puerto Rican, Cuban,etc.,is not an insult ,unless you call a Mexican a Puerto Rican, or a Cuban a Venezuelan, then all hell breaks loose.

As to the article why assume what group is being deported? Perhaps Obama is hanging out the "No Irish need apply" sign.
Or maybe he's expelling in alphabetical order. Lookout Aunt Zeituni, in 66 years you'll be a goner.; 7/8/12, 2:57 PM
edutcher said...: Paco, I think you hit it. The Brazilians are not part of it, any more than Teresa Heinz was allowed by the race merchants to describe herself as African-America, even though she had more right to the title than any of the people who denounced her.

This is about the Lefties marketing the grievance culture among people whose large voting blocs they want to exploit.; 7/8/12, 3:05 PM
cubanbob said...: garage mahal said...
Everything that so-called liberals claim to care about, and their vociferous and constant complaints throughout the previous administration, basically vanished when Obama took office. The reason for that is that they don't actually care about anything except power.

Blah blah liberals this, blah blah liberals that, blah blah blah.

I know liberals better than they know themselves.

Shut up liberals you have nothing to talk about.

Even when you're right, you're wrong, shut up liberals.

SHUT UP!

Same post every thread.

7/8/12 2:02 PM

When the message is the same for 100 years and unchanging......; 7/8/12, 4:10 PM
cubanbob said...: garage mahal said...
Everything that so-called liberals claim to care about, and their vociferous and constant complaints throughout the previous administration, basically vanished when Obama took office. The reason for that is that they don't actually care about anything except power.

Blah blah liberals this, blah blah liberals that, blah blah blah.

I know liberals better than they know themselves.

Shut up liberals you have nothing to talk about.

Even when you're right, you're wrong, shut up liberals.

SHUT UP!

Same post every thread.

7/8/12 2:02 PM

When the message is the same for 100 years and unchanging......; 7/8/12, 4:11 PM
Chip S. said...: Wait, you mean you're being serious in arguing that "Latino" refers only to men?

"Latino" is an abreve for latinoamericano, which pretty obviously is a self-descriptive term used by people whose heritage is Latin American--males and females, Brazilians and non-Brazilians.

"Hispanic" is an English word, so I suppose it means whatever gringos use it to mean. But "Hispánico" refers specifically to Spanish heritage and culture, so it would exclude Brazil but include Equatorial Guinea.; 7/8/12, 4:22 PM
Gary Rosen said...: "When people screamed "what about not just Hezbollah and Somalis pouring in?""

Talkin' 'bout your Jew-killing butt buddies, Fudd?; 7/8/12, 4:23 PM
Hagar said...: "Finnlander" is Swedish.; 7/8/12, 4:56 PM
Paddy O said...: The Swedes make fun of Norwegians and the Norwegians make fun of the Swedes, who makes fun of the Finns?

Other Finns? That's sort of sad.; 7/8/12, 4:58 PM
Chip S. said...: Bad news, leslyn. Hispanics call them los finlandeses when speaking in Spanish. Even though they know half of them are female.; 7/8/12, 5:28 PM
Palladian said...: edutcher, you called me "dear," and Palladian, you followed it up with "honey."

Please don't call me that. I don't know you personally, so I don't like it. Thank you.

Sorry, sourpuss.; 7/8/12, 6:49 PM
Phil 314 said...: Only 33 Democrats, 12 Republicans and one independent voted to advance the bill, while 15 Democrats joined 37 Republicans and one independent to block it.

Can someone please tell me why George Bush's immigration reform failed? And then tell me that Dems don't use the issue to hammer Repubs when, in fact, they really don't want "comprehensive immigration reform"; 7/8/12, 8:05 PM
Ralph L said...: Eisenhower deported a few boatloads of illegals to southern Mexico, and the people stopped crossing the border once news got around about the long walk home. Does anyone have the spine to try that again?; 7/8/12, 9:56 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: Paco Wové,

But "Hispanic/Latino/etc" is no worse in this regard than "Asian-American". Both cram a huge, highly varied swathe of humanity into the same bland bureaucratic pigeonhole.

"Asian-American," taken literally, is a perfectly worthless descriptor. On what grounds does it make sense to group people from (say) Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, Pakistan, all of China, South Korea, all of India, Kashmir, Bangladesh, the Philipines, Singapore, Bali, and Sumatra (and a lot I've left out, including the residents of the large majority of Russia that's about a third of the Asian continent) together?

On logical grounds, India has exactly as much right to call itself a content as Europe does, by the way. "Subcontinent," my hiney. (No, not really -- the hiney could use reduction, but it isn't that big.)

Of course, "Asian-American" isn't taken literally at all, so far as college admissions in the US go; it means "southeast Asian," mostly Chinese/Japanese/Korean/Vietnamese/Thai/Lao." Filipinos get their own category (= "get racial preferences, as the others don't"), and Persians, Saudis, Indians, Pakistanis, and other residents of Asia don't register, college admissions-wise, as "Asian" at all.

That's in the US. In the UK, "Asian" means something completely different. This is because the UK had colonies, whereas we merely imported convenient workers.

wv: heintown 33. I swear.; 7/8/12, 11:22 PM
Rusty said...: It all seems to me rather artificial.

No shit. Ya think , sweetheart?; 7/9/12, 6:35 AM
Anthony said...: Leslyn -

It's "latinos". It's a Spanish word, which means that the adjective form is not capitalized, and that the masculine plural includes the feminine.

"Hispanic" excludes Brazilians, French-Guianese, Haitians, and probably some others. (I'm not sure if either includes Jamaicans, Guyanese, Belizians, or Surinamese.) It probably includes Spaniards, though that has been the source of legal controversy.; 7/9/12, 2:54 PM
Anthony said...: I'd guess that at least some of these "accomplishments" might ring positively with swing voters in swing states, if presented well. Could Obama get away with campaigning in Ohio on increased deportations of illegals, or prosecuting more vigorously the war in Afghanistan?

Of course, he'd have to overcome
this; 7/9/12, 2:59 PM
Lo Pay said...: I think because the Bushes were from Texas, and were governors of states with large Latino populations, they see immigration as necessary for various economic and social reasons. Obama has also closed a lot of medical marijuana shops in California. So small business bad - government make work enforcement jobs good.; 7/9/12, 7:11 PM
Unknown said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 7/27/12, 1:20 AM