I could list a hundred reasons here and now, off the top of my head, why the Libertarian Party is superior to the Republican & Democratic Parties in the United States; and why my fellow Americans would be best-served to defect from those old relics of duopoly and embrace the fresh young Party of principle, human freedom, and better ideas. For the purposes of this writing, I'm only going to focus on the current R&D-monopolized government's handling of the issue of immigration.
Once upon a time; I was a young socially conservative evangelical Republican Party voter, was very concerned about the potential of terrorists coming across the Mexican border, and just not sure how I felt about being a blue-collar laborer in industry in the United States while some factories were moving to Mexico and some immigrants were coming into American factories. I always did find immigration a troubling issue, fraught with conundrums and complicated ties to other big issues. For decades; I watched as the Republican Party continuously used the immigration issue to whip up the base for public demonstrations and fundraising, but ultimately seemed to enjoy having the issue as a tool - as opposed to ever actually 'fixing' the issue (like so many issues both R&D Parties keep in limbo for the utility of the political tool).
I would first point out that the growth of Leviathan into this two-headed monster has only gotten worse over time. Regardless of whether Republicans or Democrats control the wheels of state power; the size, scope, power, authority, budget, and influence of the state only ever really grows. For those of us who might think that the government at its' very best could only ever be a necessary evil, and at it's very worst the most destructive and immoral cult of murder ever to pollute humanity's experience on Earth, the concept of down-sizing government and letting free people innovate is just never actually given a chance under the current system. The central-planning approach of the progressive era has completely drowned out those of us who are convinced of the moral and utilitarian superiority of individual liberty - in a sea of bureaucratic red-tape, nonstop state-worshiping propaganda, and enough statist divisiveness and violence to keep people confused and afraid and dependent on the false sense of security offered by the state.
There are so many big changes that need to be made and could be made at the federal level of American government. We have a state that is trigger-happy and stuck on war-mongering. Everything from the 'war on drugs,' the 'war on terror,' and the 'war on immigration,' is all really just a war on the American people and our rights that is being waged by our government - and a hot shooting war at that. Immigration woes could largely be solved just by doing the ethical and economically-sound thing in many other areas of federal policy; like ending the war on drugs, and rolling back the global military empire. The U.S. government is obsessed with war-making on everything and everybody, and it is up to peace-loving free people to assert our dissent and stop it.
Recently; one of the symptoms of the state virus with which America is infected, has become a hot issue because of the change in policy enforcement under the POTUS Trump Administration now resulting in a massive boom in incarceration of immigrants, and the reported physical removal of children from their parents at the point of government's guns. This recent manifestation of the state's inherent violence is only a small glimpse of one of the plethora of other symptoms that is the disease of turning to the state's guns for solutions to society's ills. And instead of being sucked in by the state's old games of divide and set humans to fighting against each other in infinitum, I think it's time we quit allowing the politicians to get away with this negligence and smokescreen of lies and manipulation of the public.
One of the most common and reliable objections to free immigration within the Republican Party has for decades been the existence of the welfare state, and the ability of immigrants to abuse it for profit at American citizen's expense. This was always the 'trump card' (if you will), of the argument to close American national boundaries and even have trade wars with other countries - very much extremely authoritarian collectivist and radically anti-freedom positions, and just not morally or economically justifiable upon closer analysis (which we're not doing here this time (maybe another writing later)). Unfortunately, the Democratic Party is really no better on this issue, and their track record proves that upon closer analysis as well - whether you go back to early progressives, the more conservative Clinton years, or look at the deportation numbers during the Obama Administration.
We can no longer afford to let the R&D duopoly keep screwing this up, and the most recent examples of human incarceration and child victimization at the hands of the state's enforcers are proof of that. Whereas it was the theocratic/nationalist religious right conspiracy theorists who in years past had been fear-mongering about how the government was going to throw all the 'good christian people' in America into converted Wal-Mart warehouses, isn't it ironic that it is the very (R) POTUS candidate for which their voting demographic broke for in record numbers - that is now responsible for the very human rights crises America now faces with all the little brown foreign children warehoused like chickens on an industrial farm. Embarrassing before the world community, the current state of locking up so many immigrants and even separating children from parents in the process is sickeningly reminiscent of our nation's dark history of relocation and genocide of the native population, African slavery in the old south, and internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII. It should not escape the citizen's watchful eye that not only does the one hand not know what the other is doing within the American government, but the actions of those like Oregon (D) Senator Jeff Merkley reveal that the American government operates in secret and often one hand is NOT EVEN ALLOWED to know what the other is doing: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/14/us/family-separation-migrant-children-detention.html.
Although the UN has its' own problems, it's noteworthy that even the world community's voice has spoken up to condemn this 'uncharacteristic' human rights violation by the United States government: http://www.newsweek.com/trump-united-nations-immigrants-children-human-rights-border-959710
*LIBERTY IN OUR TIME
The red herrings of the R&D duopoly and those old parties' appeals to entrust them with more government power should, and I believe is, falling more on deaf ears all the time. The R&D Paties' approach to doing everything is part of a pre-internet archaic and barbaric system of organizing human beings with big centralized state planning and firepower to force conformity. But we don't have to do that anymore. We are one human family. We are not one another's enemy. All human beings are born with the same inalienable/natural/human rights; and everyone everywhere should enjoy the birthright of human freedom - including freedom of association, freedom of motion, freedom of movement, freedom of travel, freedom of transport, and the voluntary exchange of goods and services among consenting peaceful actors the world over. The respect for the self-ownership of the individual and consensual human interactions must be the basis of any possible framework of a civil society - and that is where the current state has already failed and become the assailant, and seeks to stoke hatreds and divisions among us. It is time for Americans to strip this R&D duopoly of its' monopoly in government, and assert our will to be a peaceful country of freedom-loving people. It is time we stand boldly and challenge the R&D propaganda with our firm conviction in the principles of human freedom. The reason tightening government's grip on immigration doesn't make sense is both moral and economic; but I will also say this: great should be our conviction in liberty that we echo those words etched at the Statue of Liberty:
"Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
MOTHER OF EXILES. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!""
The idea is that Americans were the kind of people who are so convinced of the moral power and utilitarian principle of freedom, that we challenge the rest of the world to actually let America have the people they no longer want. In this land of freedom and opportunity, if and when we actually live up to that ideal, we believe that even those who the rest of the world has written off as useless - they still have value; both as people, and as contributors to the wealth of culture, as well as the dynamic economies of free markets. So; even screening out immigrants w/o higher education or who have not yet accumulated significant wealth is not consistent w/ the American conviction that people will thrive when you empower them to exercise their liberties. It's an understanding that when you observe people's freedom to innovate, adapt, and work on their own passions and ideals - that freedom will yield the fruits of a thriving humanity. Belief in the power of people's creativity will always be superior to belief that people need to be segregated. Two wrongs don't make a right, and it is a sorry excuse to employ state violence against your neighbor (and taking the easy way out by blaming people in another geographic region) - as opposed to identifying the real root of the problem and cutting out that cancer instead (that cancer being government intervention in the first place). It is never wrong to do the right thing; and it is always right to defend the vulnerable among us - such as the weak, innocent, and defenseless. It is always right to support the robust freedoms and liberties of all humanity, regardless of whether that is in social interactions and/or economic activity - all actions of a voluntary and peaceful nature.
https://www.fff.org/2016/05/19/open-borders-libertarian-position-immigration/
But you won't find that in the R&D Parties. Sure, you might get a few eccentrics that pay it lip-service, but the R&D Parties are ultimately locked up in the old left-right paradigm of yesterdays' authoritarian politics. When the old Parties disagree, it is mostly whichever Party has an authoritarian and state solution that will get its' way; and when the Parties agree, it is almost always only on that which they find common authoritarian ground and state solutions. I'm not necessarily going to say that the Libertarian Party is the answer either. In fact, we would do well to heed the American founders' warnings about the corruption and tyranny of political parties - so the LP is NOT a savior, by any means...
But here's what the LP may just be able to offer:
As a young oncoming national Party that is not yet tied into the old political machine and beholden to all the same old interest as are the R&D duopoly, the LP is now sitting pretty to offer the American people an opportunity to strike a devastating blow to the R&D Party duopoly and actually become a vehicle for the big political changes our country needs and the old Parties are not in a position to offer...
And it is already happening.
You should get on board.
Within the Libertarian Party, there has been pretty fair consistency on the immigration issue now for the over 4 decades since its' inception. This is a piece written several years ago by a former Party chair: https://www.lp.org/news-press-releases-libertarian-chair-time-to-re-legalize-immigration/
There is even a caucus within the LP that has its' own position on immigration, and I would actually find myself more of this persuasion: http://www.lpradicalcaucus.org/platform
In the grassroots of the Libertarian Party and the wider 'liberty movement,' there are new coalitions and alliances being forged and people concerned about human rights and civil liberties getting organized to offer the American people solutions that honor our greatest American ideals - proposals which keep our fidelity to the sanctity of life, the inalienable right of individual liberty, the proper civil observance for private property rights, and respect for the freedom we all wish to have to pursue each our own ideas of happiness. Significant to the evolution of this process is the rise of the Mises Caucus (named for lauded economist Ludwig von Mises (Nobel-prize winning economist Friederich Hayek's mentor)) and the juggernaut it promises to be as we go into the 2018 Libertarian Party National Convention in New Orleans in less than 2 weeks from now. Finally; with a reasonable approach to a principled stance on immigration, this position piece was just recently release by the Mises Caucus - and I find it to be one with which I can agree, and one which I think any humane and civil person with a firm grasp of economic principles could be proud to support: http://lpmisescaucus.com/2018/06/08/libertarians-on-immigration/
*CONCLUSION
We have allowed ourselves to be divided and victimized by governments and the authoritarians who rule them for far too long. 'We The People' need to stand as a united front to alter and abolish those old forms of government that no longer serve us, and those statist institutions which divide us and conquer our free nature - setting us to hatred and violence against one another. We should refuse to be divided. We should refuse to be made aggressors against each other. We should refuse the violent solutions of the state. We should quit making excuses for this security racket of a corporate mafia we call government; and we should embrace the future of freedom, peace, prosperity, and individual empowerment.
– Adam G. “Brick” House - is an Afghanistan war veteran and former licensed minister (UPCI), who has become an outspoken skeptic, peace advocate, and involved himself in many other issues which he believes affect the individual freedoms of the people whose inalienable rights he took an oath to defend. He currently resides in Texas, where he is recovering from PTSD, enjoys the therapeutic hobbies of training Muay Thai, playing drums, gardening, writing, and other forms of artistic expression \m/