by Rod D. Martin
January 12, 2018

Dick Durban says Donald Trump called several countries “sh*tholes”. The entire Democrat-Enemedia complex immediately labeled that proof of “racism”.

For the sake of argument, assume Trump said it (he denies it). Does the race card apply?

Pointing out that Haiti and Somalia are awful places filled with uneducated, unskilled people is only racist if you believe it is the duty of the United States to import all of the people who live there and put them on welfare. And yes, some people absolutely believe that.

But if you believe there’s a limit to the number of people who can come here each year (which is the law), and if you believe that at least part of the purpose of allowing immigration is to improve conditions in this country — not just to make the foreign aid budget domestic — then it makes sense to have a merit-based immigration system. And “merit-based”, by and large, would necessarily favor people with education and skills, people who can immediately contribute to society more than they take from it.

Now of course, if you’re a Democrat, you’d rather have people who will immediately be dependent on government, and who will come pre-equipped with the socialist beliefs of their countries of origin, because your real aim is to change the voting majority here as rapidly as possible (and since you’re aborting a great many of your own future voters, you need immigration to help you achieve that).

Haiti, Somalia et al. are awful places not because they’re unlucky, or because anyone exploited them. They’re awful places because of the beliefs of their rulers, and the people who empowered their rulers, for centuries. Don’t believe me? Look at South Korea, or Taiwan, countries that were as poor as Haiti and Somalia two generations ago, and which are now the envy of the world.

So even if we assume Donald Trump said what Dick Durban (a pathological liar if there ever were one) claims he said, then Trump captured all that with an economy of words. And it’s more than a bit telling that the pearl-clutchers in both parties just happen to be the ones most committed to either or both of my paragraphs one and three above.


— Sh*tholes, Race, and Merit-Based Immigration originally appeared as a Facebook post by Rod D. Martin.