Nationalism and Racism

The election of Trump as President in 2016 was a shock to many people. His popularism vote and a renewed commitment to “Make America Great Again” was seen by some as racist. They interpreted his anti-immigrant policy and anti-Islamic travel ban as “Make America White Again”. They are wrong. Let me sxplain the difference between nationalism and racism.

- Sept. 2018

What is Nationalism?

Nationalism is a political, social, and economic system characterized by the promotion of the interests of a particular nation, especially with the aim of gaining and maintaining sovereignty (self-governance) over the homeland. The political ideology of nationalism holds that a nation should govern itself, free from outside interference and is linked to the concept of self-determination. Nationalism is further oriented towards developing and maintaining a national identity based on shared, social characteristics, such as culture and language, religion and politics, and a belief in a common ancestry.^[1][2] Nationalism, therefore, seeks to preserve a nation's culture, by way of pride in national achievements, and is closely linked to patriotism.

What is Racism?

Racism is the belief in the superiority of one race over another, which often results in discrimination and prejudice towards people based on their race or ethnicity.

Supporting Nationalism does not necessarily imply racism. Nationalism as practiced by Nazi Germany was racist. They believe in the superiority of the Aryan race.

Nationalism in America is the belief that our national soverignty is first and foremost. We will not succumb to the will of the One World Order.

We are a nation of immigrants. Most if not all our ancestors came from another country. Very few are decendants of Native Americans. Our nation was founded by mostly Europeans from England. We had slaves from Africa who were later emancipated after the civil war. Over time, we had waves of immigrants from Irland and Italy and Germany and China and Japan and Mexico and Puerto Rico...and almost every nation on earth.

In every case, the immigrants came here, assimilated to our way of life, learned our language, learned about our Constituional government and after a period of 5 years or more, became a naturalized citizen with full rights and priviledges.

That is the traditional way to become an American. Their children after that were natural born citizens by birth.

As a nation, we are exceptional. I explained that terminology in another article called

What Is American Exceptionalism.

In order to preserve our nation and our sovereignty, our Constitution clearly state how new immigrants can become citizens. There is a process where a period of time is involved. This gives the individual time to assimilate and understand our system and adopt it as his own. After that period, he is given a civics test as part of the citizenship application. This is conducted in English to make sure the person can communicate in our common language.

Any form of entering our country without proper documents such as a VISA or a passport is illegal. In addition, overstaying a VISA is also a form of illegal immigration. A loophole in our law allows anyone who are born here regardless the status of the parents are citizens by birth. These are referred to as “anchor babies”. Once the babies are citizens, their parents may apply for legal residence and cannot be deported.

What is the growing threat? They can be identified in four areas. First, they are hurting our economic well being by providing low wage workers which takes jobs away from Americans. Second, there is potential for terrorists entering our country to cause us harm. Third, there is possibility of communicable diseases being transmitted. Fourth, they are slowly eroding our nation and our sovereignty.

Here is where the racism charges are surfacing. There are some people who claim any attempt at stopping illegal immigration by our government and ICE, is a racist act. They claim it is a way to keep America a White majority. Most immigrants who crosses our southern borders are Mexicans. The anti-Moslem travel ban from certain Middle East countries is also an indicators of racist act against non-white people.

These charges are false.

It is not racist to protect our borders. All nations do so.

It is not racist to document who comes here. Every other civilized nation demand the same.

It is not racist to keep out some groups of people because they come from a nation that has no easy way to vet the individual.

It is not racist to demand they pass a physical health exam before entering our country.

It is not racist to keep out gang members and drug dealers and human traffickers.

It is not racist to put the safety and well beings of American citizens above the wishes of illegal immigrants.

If you doubt what I am saying, just look at France, Germany and Sweden and Canada...They have taken in many refugees in recent years and most of them from Moslem countries such as Syria and Iraq and other countries in turmoil. They are not assimilating for the most part. There are some neighborhoods in Paris that police will not patrol. These enclaves are controlled by the local immigrants and they govern with Sharia law. There is a huge problem is some German towns where the number of refugees and immigrants out number their own people. They are losing their identity piece by piece.

In Vancover Canada, there are whole neighborhoods owned by Asians. These are affluent immigrants who buys houses with cash. They drove up the local real estate market such that regular citizens cannot afford to live there any more. It is not always poor uneducated immigrants that is the problem.

The problem of illegal immigration has plaqued us for a very long time. Under both Democratic and Republican administrations, they have failed us. Trump is the first president since Ronald Reagan that wants to fix it. He is encountering opposition from all sides including our courts.

Why not do business as usual? Kick the can down the road...

The American people are fed up. We want to control our borders. We want a one tier work force. We want to preserve our nation as envisioned by our forefathers. We want a color blind society that lives by a set of laws.

We want to control our own destiny.

Let me address those who are against building the wall, who claims it is too expensive and that it will not work anyway...

They also refuse to acknowledge that not securing our borders is essentially having an open borders policy. They don’t like the sound of that.

Here is exactly why not building a border is open borders. There is no middle ground here. It is like being pregnant. Either you are or you aren’t pregnant. We have tried everything else including big talk. Congress campaign on it and made promises...and yet failed to deliver. Why? A wall or physical barrier will stop 95% of the illegal crossings. It is not the only way but a big component. Combined with increased efforts of ICE and tracking people here on expired VISAs. Deporting criminals that have committed felonies. Over time, we will stop this influx.

Once we stop the flow, we can then focus on dealing with the 20 million or so that are here already. If they did not commit any felonies, and they pay a fine and perform some public service, they may be granted a path a citizenship over a period of time. It is only fair.