I am disturbed that in the Feb. 16 “Agree to Disagree” column, “Mirror, mirror, on the wall. Who’s the smartest of them all,” Ethan Strimling praised President Barack Obama’s recent actions to ignore federal immigration law and suggested that the (now ended) attempt by Republicans to defund them was “wicked stupid.”

Strimling insists that Obama giving relief from deportation and work permits to illegal aliens is “humane and necessary.” Apparently his humanitarian concerns do not include American workers who will have to compete with these aliens for whole new classes of jobs that these work permits will allow them to take. Nor does his compassion extend to the families of Americans such as Grant Ronnebeck, murdered by illegal aliens who were spared deportation under Obama policies despite having criminal records that supposedly would disqualify them.

His concern that making Department of Homeland Security funding contingent on defunding Obama’s amnesty is “messing with our nation’s safety over political finger-pointing” is disingenuous. If Obama is suspending enforcement of the law, why should it matter whether DHS is funded?

Most outrageous is Strimling’s assertion that if the Republicans want to repeal Obama’s orders, they ought to make them moot by passing “comprehensive immigration reform” (amnesty) themselves. So the appropriate response to the president deciding to ignore laws he does not like it is to change them to his liking?

If someone refuses to give money to a panhandler, and the panhandler then robs him, do you blame the victim for not giving him money earlier? If a woman wants to avoid being sexually assaulted, do you tell her that the way to avoid assault is to consent so that it is no longer qualifies as assault?

Perhaps it is time we stop taking anyone who cares more about illegal aliens than about American citizens seriously.

Michael Jose

Augusta