Acting DHS Secretary McAleenan Gets Hounded Off Stage – and the University’s Response Sucks!
Immigration debates have all but ceased in America because one side of this issue no longer supports the notion of a free exchange of ideas based on a mutuality of respect. As Dick Lamm warned in 1985, left unchecked, mass immigration would build “a deadly disunity.”
Well, the disunity has arrived. The disrespect now visited upon government officials and key influentials has spun out of control. It doesn’t change anything, but these narcissistic asshats are free to gloat about it to their friends on social media.
Exhibit A: Students and activists thought that, rather than let him present his keynote address, it was appropriate to hound and bully Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan offstage at a Migration Policy Institute conference on Monday at Georgetown University Law School.
McAleenan is, by any stretch, one of the more moderate voices on immigration policy in the Trump Administration. And, by all accounts, total legal immigration under this president remains at all-time record highs. So is this the right person to abuse in this manner?
The Migration Policy Institute is also hardly an organization that supports reduced immigration or better border control. It is overseen by people like Doris Meissner (Clinton appointee) and Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Democrats closely aligned with a liberalized immigration policy. Arguably they have been two people who’ve helped produce immigration crisis the nation currently faces today.
No one at MPI is particularly aligned with FAIR’s views on any immigration policy issue – to put it mildly. Any quick glance at the video of the exchange shows that Doris Meissner did a very poor job dealing with the situation.
The protesters claim they are from “CREDO” – described as a liberal activist group which no one has ever heard of, of course. It is an adhoc group formed for just such irritating, juvenile actions. But other students were also involved.
In general “liberal” should imply a commitment to truly liberal-minded principles most clearly reflected in our First Amendment freedoms. Their position, apparently tolerated by the university, is that First Amendment freedoms on college campus aren’t really about free speech or free ideas – they are about the freedom to only hear your own point of view.
The Dean of Georgetown Law, William Treanor, opined that this disruption was unfortunate, and that the school is committed to free expression. Clearly more than a few of his students don’t really care what he thinks.
In truth, maybe these students don’t care what people think. But I wonder what their parents think? Elizabeth Warren is frantic over the question of college loan debt, and I would imagine many parents are too. It must add salt to their wounds to realize that their children are going into such debt to gain so many worthless life lessons throughout college and graduate school. Lessons such as, you can learn a great deal in life by refusing to hear alternative points of view.