Obama Waterboards the Definition of Amnesty in Immigration Speech

In his
immigration speech last night, President Barack Obama said “We
need reasoned, thoughtful, compassionate debate that focuses on our
hopes, not our fears.” If only we had a president who could meet
this pressing need.

Consider this passage, on the emotionally loaded word
“amnesty”:

I know some of the critics of the action call it amnesty. Well,
it’s not. Amnesty is the immigration system we have today. Millions
of people who live here without paying their taxes or playing by
the rules, while politicians use the issue to scare people and whip
up votes at election time. That’s the real amnesty, leaving this
broken system the way it is.

Supple as it may be, the English language does not permit us to
address the discomfort of certain words by changing their plain
meaning. Most definitions of “amnesty” run something like this: “the act of
releasing or protecting a person or persons from prosecution for
wrongdoings.” Obama’s proposal last night was to release a
large category of persons from punishment for breaking U.S. law, if
they agree to meet certain conditions. So by a fair reading of the
word’s dictionary definition, this is a conditional
amnesty, or even a temporary conditional amnesty, given
that President Ted Cruz will likely reverse it. But an amnesty
nonetheless.

What is definitely not amnesty is what Obama said it
was: the status quo, in which the class of people under discussion
live under a
permanent, destabilizing threat of deportation. Yes, some of
them don’t pay their income taxes, but, believe it or not, many
(and possibly most)
do. Many also pay into Social Security without much hope
of ever receiving anything back, providing a little bonus
surplus to our sagging welfare state. And of course, where
applicable, illegal immigrants pay sales and property taxes as
well.

The most significant way that illegal immigrants aren’t “playing
by the rules,” is the fact that they live here without government
permission. Is that de facto amnesty? No: They have not
benefited from a “releasing or protecting” from punishment; they’re
just on a lucky streak, but still liable to be ejected from the
country at any time. At least until Obama’s temporary conditional
amnesty kicks in.

My fellow supporters of vastly increased legal immigration to
this country do not, I believe, further their cause by retreating
into soft-focus euphemism (DREAMers!) or sidestepping uncomfortable
language just because it has proven politicially effective for
people on the other side of the issue.

If you recognized the existence of more than 10 million
unpermitted residents in this country as the product more of
prohibition than of criminality, and acted upon
that insight foremostly by expanding and deregulating legal
immigration, then I predict the word “amnesty” would start to lose
some of its negative potency. People really resent
line-jumpers when the queue stretches back as
far as the eye can see; speed up that process and our national
debate would look a lot more reasoned and thoughtful.