Dara Lind is skeptical of the confidence the NYT shows in these numbers.

Example: a lot of people come and go on a regular basis. How do you reliably measure departures?

Both the original article and the thread in 1 are interesting (and note, the final comment in the thread is, "I do think a lot more people came under Biden than a lot of doves realize, I just am, uh, waiting until 2026 to find that out for sure")

I too had thought immigration was more a media-generated story than a real-world one, but maybe not.

No time to debunk right now, but a chunk of this David Leonhardt bullshit and spin. Directionally correct, however, and certainly the perception that fueled the election.

Fucking wanker who was key to scaremongering covid measures and aiding the Fox/Republican undermining of public health.

this has felt totally invisible in my daily life.

Yeah, I'm an outlier for several reasons, but I wonder how widespread that is, and if the voting patterns actually reflect it in some way (my assumption would be no).

If I recall correctly, in 2016, counties with the highest % of immigrants had larger Obama->T swings than those with lower numbers. Now I should look that up...

"In truth, immigrants have historically committed crime at lower rates than native-born Americans, and crime fell nationwide over the past few years as immigration levels spiked." ....so if we take the limit.....

"In truth, immigrants have historically committed crime at lower rates than native-born Americans, and crime fell nationwide over the past few years as immigration levels spiked." ....so if we take the limit.....

People around here always complain about the population getting older and not enough young families moving in.

Gosh, I wonder if being more welcoming to immigrants would improve that situation?

And if there are so many immigrants around, how come its so difficult and expensive to find people to build houses, work in nursing homes, and serve on road construction crews?

Even if immigration surged as much as the article said, I think the negative valence people put on it is media-driven, not about it actually hurting them. And not that that's not widespread: I read (from non-Friedmanesque sources) about NYC cabbies complaining about refugees being put up in hotels, etc. But it is objectively a good thing that they come, and Dems should be finding a way to make the majority agreement with this more salient.

The number of people who have left Venezuela and Cuba recently is really astounding. Obviously they haven't all (or even most!) come to the US, but it is a genuinely unusual situation. 8% of Cubans left between 2021 and 2024.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021-2023_Cuban_migration_crisis

Kevin Drum plots "encounters on the southwest border" here (no two-year lag) https://jabberwocking.com/were-still-trying-to-figure-out-why-latinos-abandoned-kamala-harris/

The thread in 1, like comment 2, makes the point that for that you need not only arrivals but also departures. OK, but the arrivals themselves are the story, right?

I also am oblivious to this surge in real life - it's something that happens, not on the news because I'm not watching, but in blogs discussing the news, or maybe in blogs discussing how the news is covered and what constitutes news. It's pretty meta by the time it hits me.

But it is objectively a good thing that they come, and Dems should be finding a way to make the majority agreement with this more salient.

I feel like there's a bit of question begging going on in that sentence. First I don't know that you can say that it's "objectively a good thing" in every possible scenario. Even if you think that, as a general rule, it's a good thing, that doesn't mean that more is always better. Secondly, I'm quite confident that the "majority agreement" you describe is contingent in various ways.

I remember the reaction to Syrian refugees in Germany. For example, here's a recent article: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy7kxn6p878o

There are around a million people with a Syrian passport in Germany. Most of them came from 2015-16, after Angela Merkel's government made a decision not to close Germany's borders to refugees fleeing Syria's civil war.

The mood at the time was that Germany would manage. The climate now is rather different.

Within hours of the news of Assad's fall, a fierce political debate erupted in Germany over whether Syrian refugees should go back to Syria.

It is perfectly possible that Germany is managing but the politics of it are very much not a consensus agreement.

First I don't know that you can say that it's "objectively a good thing" in every possible scenario. Even if you think that, as a general rule, it's a good thing

It's a combination of practical and moral I guess. People are damn near the foundation of social value; their presence enriches a society or place. If you throw them into camps or keep them from working, they might be a pure drain, but that's a policy failure. Given the chance they enhance an economy and help the existing residents.

I'm quite confident that the "majority agreement" you describe is contingent in various ways.

I definitely agree with that; it's a weak preference, living with other contradictory anti-immigrant preferences, but it's one to latch onto and make some use of.

I'm not sure what I'm supposed to take from the BBC link. What harm is being proposed?

I'm not sure what I'm supposed to take from the BBC link.

My point was that (a) refugees ended up ending the Merkel government and (b) it remains a contentious issue. The passage of time has not smoothed over the politics.

It's a combination of practical and moral I guess. People are damn near the foundation of social value; their presence enriches a society or place.

I generally agree with that -- my great-grandparents were immigrants; I don't feel that far removed (and, FWIW, I appreciated Bryan Caplan's book Open Borders).

However . . . I don't think it's simple or trivial to increase immigration. Practically speaking there isn't a way to have unlimited immigration AND make support available for immigrants AND avoid complaints.

I don't know what the limits are, but I think it's important to take warning signs seriously and think that they may reflect real limits not just messaging problems.

I think I've said this before, but I think the choice is limiting immigration or fascism. I just thought Biden was doing enough to limit immigration and that Republicans had done enough to block efforts at improving things that Harris would be able to win.

That Kevin Drum piece is exasperating in such a classically Kevin Drum way. IT'S THE FUCKING MACHISMO AND ECONOMY, YOU DINGBAT.

I think I've said this before, but I think the choice is limiting immigration or fascism.

I don't see why we should have to choose. Can't we have BOTH?

I think the choice is limiting immigration or fascism.

At the end of the day, I don't think "caving to fascists" is going limit fascism.

I am aware of an increase in the number of people with families who have legal status but aren't working because our shelter system is overflowing.

8% of Cubans left between 2021 and 2024.

It seems like if we actually wanted to reduce immigration from Cuba we could end the Cuba embargo.

20: That's what most likely.

19: Oddly enough, last night my family had an extensive discussion about the meaning of dingbat. My stepdaughter asked us what it meant. I looked it up and it turns out to have several meanings (a typographical ornament, a style of apartment building as well as a foolish person). But to Americans of my age, dingbat is Edith Bunker. Do younger folks have that association at all?

It's an ice cream thing.

No, my association with dingbats is the font.

A big part of making immigration a more broadly spread positive is making housing construction as rapidly responsive as possible so it doesn't making housing more of a seller's market for very long.

25: I know it as the apartment style, but I'm weird that way. The bigger association is, yes, dummy. Is that different from how it's used in the Bunker family?

A big part of making immigration a more broadly spread positive is making housing construction as rapidly responsive as possible . . .

On one hand, yes, I agree and, on the other hand, that's not an easy first step. You may have a better sense, but my impression is that the YIMBY movement has had enough success to get to the point of, "okay, this is not going to be a simple thing to change."

But to Americans of my age, dingbat is Edith Bunker. Do younger folks have that association at all?

I know her enough to get it, but not quite enough to have actively put her forth as the quintessential bat of dings.

I don't have more than vibes, but my vibes are that people actually don't care about the nuances of immigration status. They just don't like people who look foreign.

A question I've vaguely wondered is why exactly anti-semitism is on the rise. Broadly speaking, the type of people who do anti-semitic things are also the type of people who aren't upset about Palestinians being killed. The people who are upset about Palestinians usually seem very willing to qualify their anger with a #notallJews caveat.

(The conclusion I've come to is that it's traditional antisemitism, and not really connected to Gaza.)

I will say that despite anger about Gaza being richly deserved and felt by many people who are not remotely antisemitic, it has also been seized on by traditional antisemites. I don't know how to deal with this rhetorically.

You could argue people need to take turns with genocide.

29: Yes, a dummy, but it was what Archie called Edith all the time, and this was the most popular show on TV at the time, so for my generation, she IS the bat of dings.

32: It's all affect. The reasons come later.

I associate dummy with Dennis and Liz Lemon on 30 Rock.

People love Trump and Trump hates immigrants so people hate immigrants.

40: I would guess there's more of the opposite. People hate immigrants, and Trump hates immigrants, so people love Trump.

Who are these people anyway? They seem like assholes.

Let's not invite them to our blog.

14 "The mood at the time was that Germany would manage. The climate now is rather different."

And the difference is 100% the lack of Merkel. She reminded Germans that every single German family, and I mean every last fucking one of them, has a refugee story. Very often it's within living memory. Her approach is not the usual response from a German conservative, more's the pity.

I am almost reconciled to Merz because he's probably going to help Ukraine more, just to be the anti-Scholz, but man, the Christian Democrats are resolutely un-Christian about welcoming the stranger.

|| Judge Rejects Sale of Infowars to The Onion

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/10/business/media/the-onion-infowars-alex-jones.html

Can't anything work out for us? ||

Maybe someday I'll understand the moral reasoning behind preventing the free movement of people anyplace in the world. It hasn't happened yet.

My brother in law worked as an attorney in the state tax department in the Saarland, based in Sankt-Ingbert. Which, in the local dialect, is pronounced dingbat.

44: what the fuck.

Sinema and Manchin block Biden's NLRB appointment, so Trump will get a majority.

I thought union organizing might be a bright spot.

And why is the FBI Director stepping down?

I don't know how I'm going to make it through another 4 years of this.

Ringing endorsement of the right to privacy from the Montana Supreme Court today. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/11/montana-blocks-ban-gender-affirming-care-trans-minors

One of our more conservative justices thought they should have gone further, holding also that the ban on gender affirming care for minors was also an equal protection violation.

I'd hoped they'd invoke our Constitution's provision on individual dignity, since this is exactly what's behind all the Nuremburg-like anti-trans bills.

The dignity of the human being is inviolable.

tbf, this isn't really separable from equal protection in our constitutional scheme, imo but the words have some power.

It would be great if there was one organization I could trust that would put together summaries of everything I need to ask my Congressional Rep to fight for. She is inoffensive milquetoast Dem who needs to hear from her constituents.

Art. II sec 4: Individual dignity. The dignity of the human being is inviolable. No person shall be denied the equal protection of the laws. Neither the state nor any person, firm, corporation, or institution shall discriminate against any person in the exercise of his civil or political rights on account of race, color, sex, culture, social origin or condition, or political or religious ideas.

Wray resigning is so pathetic and maddening. There just isn't a single norm that can withstand Trump.

Wray was a Trump appointee to start with.

40: People hate immigrants, Trump hates immigrants, so people love Trump. (That's not the whole story. Trump hates a lot of things that people love to hate. But if you want to understand what led to Trump, you need to understand the hate.)

54 before refreshing and seeing 41.

47 to 48.

49/51: Oh wow, that declaration starts with the first sentence of the first clause of post-war Germany's Basic Law. Die Würde des Menschen ist unantastbar.

I wonder if some of the 1972 drafters had experience from Herrenchiemsee (the 1948 conference in the American occupation zone that put together what became the Basic Law).

Trump doesn't hate immigrants. He's married two of them, and was given birth by another. He hates people of color.

56 This was an intentional invocation. I doubt that anyone at the CC was directly involved in that conference, but they were trying to do their best.

The provision that was the basis of today's decision: Right of privacy. The right of individual privacy is essential to the well-being of a free society and shall not be infringed without the showing of a compelling state interest.

Held, which should be coming out any day now, will be decided on this one: Inalienable rights. All persons are born free and have certain inalienable rights. They include the right to a clean and healthful environment and the rights of pursuing life's basic necessities, enjoying and defending their lives and liberties, acquiring, possessing and protecting property, and seeking their safety, health and happiness in all lawful ways. In enjoying these rights, all persons recognize corresponding responsibilities.

people who do anti-semitic things are also the type of people who aren't upset about Palestinians being killed

To be fair, Palestinians are a Semitic people. Maybe they're loopholers.

Wray leaving is another disheartening link in the chain, but did we really expect the guy he replaced Mueller with to take a heroic stand?

I saw the Montana decision go by earlier today; nice to have a bit of good news, and the echo of the Grundgesetz (even if not directly implicated here) is something, I had no idea. Do a lot of state constitutions have provisions of that sort?

He was going to be replaced. I don't know, if you were in a decision-making position would you stay? Why not get out now before you have to do a single thing that T, or his AG, directs you to do? Some deputy can be 'acting' for a month, so the ship isn't going to sink.

62 The circumstances of our constitutional convention were fairly unusual. Sauron was distracted by Aragorn advancing towards the gates of Mordor, so Frodo slipped in and dropped the ring into the lava at Mt. Doom.

Just in the same way I will never understand why people find gambling fun, I have never understood hatred of immigrants. Five of my eight great grandparents were immigrants, so three of my grandparents grew up in immigrant households. I loved my grandparents, how could I reconcile that with hating immigrants? And as far as recent immigrants go, everywhere I look I see them enriching my life and the life of my communities. From the Filipina woman at work who has been my biggest supporter and trainer in my new role to the Somali guys at the restaurant down the block who cook me fresh $2 sambusa. IHMB how Lake St in the 1980s was a morass of adult bookstores, brothels, dive bars and vacant storefronts, and how it has been completely transformed thanks to the efforts of immigrants from Mexico, South America, Africa and the Middle East. My favorite poet, an activist and stalwart member of the local arts scene emigrated from Vietnam as bombs were falling around him. He's been making my life better for 30+ years since we were in high school together. A whole lot of these recent Trump converts could tell identical stories if they would but look around themselves and see them. It's just insane. Capitalism and the state really fuck people up.

I think of capitalism is being generally pro-immigration.

There were surely precursors of the Know-Nothing Movement in colonial times -- Ben Franklin's remarks about Scots-Irish settlers on the Susquehanna frontier weren't particularly favorable -- and I think this kind of cultural narcissism is just part of our Anglo-Saxon heritage. The Pilgrims decided that death and deprivation in the New World was a better fate than assimilation in Leiden. Madness.

Ben Franklin's remarks about Scots-Irish settlers on the Susquehanna frontier weren't particularly favorable...

Give who their descendants voted for, he was just ahead of his time.

63 Wray is staying on until Jan 20. Not even giving some subordinate the chance to be Acting Director to get a star on their resume and increase their pension.

Anyway, someone should do something about these Anglo-Saxons.

Anyway, I looked it up, and that line on dignity was proposed by a con-con delegate from Kalispell. He was a professor of political science and history at the junior college there, having gotten his PhD a decade earlier at UCLA. Originally from the Boston area. I just think there's no possibility at all that the language being identical to the Grundgesetz is coincidental.

In the analogy, for those few of you not steeped in Montana history, we have the Anaconda Copper Company, Salvador Allende, and the general Montana public (there'd been a drafting error (?) and the con-con was not staffed with politicos.)

The prof says he was motivated by the struggles of his mother, an Irish-American growing up in greater Boston, to assert her dignity. (His dad was of Quebecois origin.) Take that, Anglo-Saxons!

I think of capitalism is being generally pro-immigration.

Capital is in favor of migrant labor when that labor is done by people who are disenfranchised, dispossessed and regarded as disposable by static labor. Mark well: the Homan Raids are going to be targeting a much higher percentage of undocumented workers who have some kind of organizing background than they are of the alleged rapists and murderers. Student activists and their families will also no doubt make up a big percentage of the people who are specifically tracked down by the bloodhounds. The "talented tenth" of outspoken, well-connected undocumented people are going to be in trouble, but magically there will always be enough immiserated, voiceless people around to pick the carrots and haul hods of bricks in the Arizona sun.

Interesting suggestion that Wray resigning rather than being fired makes it less likely Trump can replace him without the Senate? Not sure if that all tracks but so people know.

Only if David French and Eric Erickson have the law right here though. https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/12/04/opinion/thepoint/chris-wray-fbi-trump-step-down

I don't know how I'm going to make it through another 4 years of this.

My plan is to avoid hearing any of it in the first place.

65, 66: I think a lot of suburban conservatives, especially the older men, are secretly nostalgic for the period when American urban neighborhoods were deprived residences of last resort where they could go get their rocks off in secret at dive bars and strip clubs. I know Lake Street (I haven't been in ten years, but its really nice, and the food is incredible). The equivalent in Seattle would be Pioneer Square or Little Saigon.

As with Tulsa...the idea of immigrants and minorities creating resilient, safe neighborhoods with thriving businesses just drives them up the wall.

I was hoping to not have to look at the article to see what the NYT is measuring and whether it's a useful measure. It's certainly hard to believe rates are higher than before the first round of major immigration restriction laws in the early 20th century. On the other hand, international travel is much easier.

My Europe-side family came to the US just before the quota laws in the early 1920s. My Asia-side family came just as restrictions were relaxed in the 1960s. There are Trump supporters on both sides.

Actually, I'm just guessing about Trump support on the Europe-side. That side of the family was never close and I think the War on Christmas created too big a split when we ignored the Christmas card declaring that despite Obama's presidency, it was still ok to say Merry Christmas because America.

I was looking at someone's Bluesky account right now and almost wanted to create an account of my own so I could block some NYT politics reporters. Another sign of how Bluesky really is the twitter successor.

Dynamics around immigration are different too. Partially because of travel difficulty and expenses were higher and more immigrants to North America were involved in high-maintenance professions life farming and fishing cutting ties to the old country was a permanent thing. For Scandinavians going the PNW or Britons to BC to work in those industries once you left your hometown you were gone, forever - you were never going to see or talk to your parents, siblings, or friends again unless they followed you, except for a letter now and then. Meanwhile, the Ethiopian guy at my local corner store has a buzzy grioup chat thread with his hometown friends who now live around the US, Europe, and the Middle East.

On the other hand, the whole "global cultural hegemon" thing means that any given immigrant comes knowing more about the US than any given illiterate Neapolitan or resident of the Pale of Settlement ever did, much less a German or Swedish immigrant who could read.

the War on Christmas created too big a split when we ignored the Christmas card declaring that despite Obama's presidency, it was still ok to say Merry Christmas because America.

Wowza.

79: I have been blocking every NYT account I see on BlueSky. It's not much but it's better than nothing. Similarly I've also been unsubscribing from every Democratic email I receive. I'm sure I'll be up for it again in a few months but right now they are the last people I want to hear from.