Wait, What?

Via Hot Air:
SESSIONS:
Let me ask you this: In the workplace of America today when we have a high number of unemployed, we’ve had declining wages for many years, we have the lowest of Americans working, who has more right to a job in this country? A lawful immigrant who’s here, a green-card holder or a citizen, or a person who entered the country unlawfully?

LYNCH:
Well, Senator, I believe that the right and the obligation to work is one that’s shared by everyone in this country regardless of how they came here. And certainly, if someone here, regardless of status, I would prefer that they be participating in the workplace than not participating in the workplace…
The part of that statement Allahpundit is interested in is the part where people who are illegally in this country have a "right" to work.

The part that I want to hear more about is how the obligation to work is shared by everyone.

Really? Where is that coming from? How is this obligation grounded? What should be done to those who don't meet this obligation?

9 comments:

Eric Blair said...

Slaves.

Grim said...

It could mean 'from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.' Or it could mean Arbeit macht frei. Or it could mean 2 Thessalonians 3:10.

It's an explosive thing to say because no matter how it's grounded it has massive consequences as an idea. Somehow we just passed right by it to talk about illegals.

Dad29 said...

I caught that, too. A remarkably inept statement--or chillingly prophetic.

David Foster said...

Seems to me that the neither the question nor the response is appropriate for an AG candidate. The business of the AG is to enforce the law, not to theorize about what it should be.

A better question would have been, "Do you think the President has the right to override existing Federal statutes prohibiting employment of illegal immigrants, and if so, what is your legal reasoning, citing specific precedents, for believing so?"

In a democratic republic, the question should not be only "What should be done?" but also "Who decides?"

Matt said...

Hmm... given:

a) the basic need (shared in common with any other living creature) to take in energy and resources in order to stave off entropy and continue living,

b) the lack of any moral claim upon the fruits of another person's labor just because one chooses not to expend their own labor towards acquiring the aforementioned resources and energy needed to sustain life, and

c) the basic moral duty (under most systems of morality) to preserve one's own life,

this would seem to imply a derived obligation, if not to work, then at least to acquire a means of support that doesn't involve taking from others without their consent. Or am I missing something here?

Grim said...

Almost certainly, given the politics of the nominee.

But that's 2 Thess. 3:10.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

I'm not sure that "having a job that gives you a check" and "working" are necessarily synonymous in this instance. It chances the nuances of the discussion.

Grim said...

Or just "getting a check." That's why I doubt she means 2 Thess. etc. So what does she mean? On whom does this obligation lie, and what are its terms?

Texan99 said...

I'd like to think she meant Thess. but I suspect--if she was aware at all of the words tumbling out of her mouth--she had in mind what she thinks of as the idle rich.

I guess I've often said here that I share her attitude to a degree. If we're not going to deport people, I can't stomach forbidding them to work. I'd barely lift a finger to deport someone who was supporting himself. Yes, if he's here illegally, he's breaking a law, but it's one that this society can't quite bring itself to acknowledge as valid. The worst combination of policies I can think of is to tell him, "OK, you can stay here illegally but you can't compete with us. We'll just feed you, how about that?"

Send 'em home, or let 'em work, sez I.