As we go through life, we make many acquaintances, but few true friends. Almost everyone has a best friend, that person who will stick by you no matter what. He or she is he one who would bail you out of jail at three AM or loan you most of their life savings just because you asked.
One instance where a friend needs to be told something they don’t want to hear is when that friend is contemplating doing something really, really stupid that will harm not only themselves, but everyone around them. I’m not talking quit your job and move to Hawaii to be a beach bum stupid, I’m talking quit your job, leave your wife and kids and move to Hawaii to be a beach bum stupid.
Another instance where a friend needs to be told something they don’t want to hear is when that friend is engaging in behavior that is destructive not only to themselves, but to their friends and family. The most common example is drug or alcohol addiction. At some point the addict’s friends usually stage an intervention. This is where the addicts friends and family sit him or her down and tell them:
1. We love you.
2. You have a problem.
3. Your problem is destroying you.
4. Your problem is also destroying us.
5. You need help and we’ve arranged for you to get that help starting right now, if you will.
6. We love you.
Interventions end in one of three ways:
1. The addict admits they have a problem and accepts the help.
2. The addict denies they have a problem and refuses help.
3. The addict denies they have a problem and attacks his friends and family either verbally or physically.
Most addicts know they have a problem and will take the help when offered. A few have yet to experience either the tragedy or the moment of clarity that will make them realize their problem. They may think that because they still have a job or because the wife and kids haven’t left them yet that they’re “managing” their addiction. Most of these folks wind up in the first category once a trigger event strikes.
The most helpless and hopeless of all addicts fall into the third category. Their addiction will probably kill them. Their verbal assault on their friends and family usually involves the accusation that they do not have a problem, but that the people at the intervention have a problem.
Is this starting to sound a little familiar?
The political analogue of an intervention was the rising up of the vast majority of Americans in response to the Z visa / Amnesty portion of S.1348, now S.1639 (don’t tell me it’s not amnesty, a pig in a prom dress is still a pig). People from all sides of the political spectrum rose up and called, emailed and faxed their senators. Many of these people had never before engaged in this type of political activity.
The most recent Rasmussen poll show the bill supported by only 26% of voters with 89% of Republicans, 65% of Democrats, and 63% of unaffiliated voters in favor of increasing enforcement to reduce illegal immigration. In a Zogby poll released June 21, only 3 percent of Americans approved of Congress’s handling of the immigration issue and only 9 percent approved of the President’s. No proposed legislation in recent history has been so reviled. Could this be why congress has an all time low overall approval rating of 14%?
But like a drug addict, the President and most of the senate is turning a deaf ear to their friends — the people who vote for them — and their family — their political base — in favor of their enablers. For a drug addict, their dealer is their primary enabler. For Senate Republicans it’s business groups who want cheap labor. For Democrats it’s the prospect of millions of new citizens with low skills and low education who will be dependent on government largesse and will therefore vote Democrat. American citizens be damned.
In states whose Republican Senators voted for cloture on S.1348 thousands of Republicans are tearing up their voter registration cards and re-registering as independents. Like the hopeless/helpless drug addict in the third example above, The President’s response to this uprising was to lash out at his base, saying critics of the bill “don’t want to do what’s right for America” and accusing them of wanting to “frighten people.” Trent Lott, like the abuser blaming the abused for “asking for it” blamed talk radio (perhaps taking a cue from Hugo Chavez, threatened to “do something about it.”)
Mr. President, Senator Lott and the rest of the Republican Senators supporting amnesty, we love you, but you have a problem. You are hurting the party and hurting the nation. You need help and that help is available right now. We love you, but you must give up amnesty, you mist build the fence you promised us and you must start enforcing the existing immigration laws. Please admit you have a problem and work with us to fix this crisis. We are your friends and we are here to help.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/just_26_favor_senate_immigration_plan [1]
http://www.upi.com/Zogby/UPI_Polls/2007/06/21/analysis_majority_oppose_immigration_bill/2755/print_view/ [2]