In the December issue of the increasingly liberal (I read it merely to get a barometer of just how "lefty" things are becoming) Time Magazine, the reigning king of its merry band of disconnected columnists, Michael Kinsley, wrote a superficially clever bit of sophistry titled: "Kidding Ourselves About Immigration." In the essay, I grudgingly admit Mr. Kinsley, at least once, made a cogent point. It lept out of the otherwise muddled, disjointed and tangled discussion when he broke down the issue of immigration into two main questions:

1. Are you against immigration, altogether. Close the gates, lock the doors, put out a "Closed" sign, etc? Or,

2. Are you against illegal immigration - those who "break in line" - those who jump the border and do not go through the process we have in place to be a legal citizen? This camp still accepts the premise that we were and are a "nation built on immigrants" and legal immigration should continue.

I generally fall in the second category. I firmly believe that we should continue to attract immigrants who bring needed talents and expertise to keep America’s industries and population vibrant and innovative. But it is not with this portion of the essay with which I take issue. After struggling through the first four-fifths of the article and thinking to myself : "Old Kinsley is not waving his freak flag as high as usual; he is actually making some sense!" it fell to the last few lines to spoil my fleeting admiration for the authors new-found gift for Socratic logic. Suddenly, my adrenalin levels perceptively spiked. A feeling, by the way, which I do not particularly enjoy but suffer through for the comic relief Kinsley usually proffers.

Kinsley closes his seductively well-balanced column with this fallacy:

"Ask yourself, of these three groups--today's legal and illegal immigrants and the immigrants of generations ago--which one has proven most dramatically its appreciation of our country? Which one has shown the most gumption, the most willingness to risk all to get to the U.S. and the most willingness to work hard once here? Well, everyone's story is unique. But who loves the U.S. most? On average, probably, the winners of this American-values contest would be the illegals, doing our dirty work under constant fear of eviction, getting thrown out and returning again and again."

Now, I have to take up arms against this sort of sweeping scatology. People who have enough respect for the rule of law and go through the admittedly (and justifiably) lengthy process of applying for and waiting for their shot at the "American Dream" would get my vote as "winners of this American-values contest." Part of the American way of life - or, at least, at one time part of the American way of life - was respect for the rule of law. Those who flaunt the law of the land and skirt the existing procedures for immigration are not, in my opinion, winners in any contest relating to American values.

That little snit aside, the concluding lines of the Kinsley piece were, well, the pièce de résistance. [For the record, when I start using French phrases, I am truly in "rant mode" and cold logic often gives way to emotional diatribes; consder yourself forewarned] Kinsley’s last line did it: "And how about those of us lucky enough to have been born here? How would we do against the typical illegal alien in a "prove how much you love America" reality TV show?" Kinsley does not offer an answer to his rhetorical question but I will pick up that gauntlet - anytime.

How would "we" do? How would the typical, born-in-America (or "nativist" as Kinsley dismissively refers to us) do against an illegal immigrant in a theoretical "prove how much you love America" competition? I will tell you exactly how well most of us would do: We would clean up the floor with the typical illegal immigrant. I will go farther and state that anyone who would even dare ask the question must be one of those described by Thomas Paine at Valley Forge, in December, 1776:

"These are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives everything its value."

Illegal immigrants, for the most part, are the "summer soldiers and the sunshine patriots." We "nativists" - a description that I, unlike Kinsley, embrace proudly - are the ones who have paid our taxes, worked among and for our fellow citizens, served in our nation’s military (personally, 1977-1989), stood by our nation during some of its lowest nadirs (Watergate, the Viet Nam War, Cuban Missile Crisis, Iranian Hostage Crisis, and 9/11/2001) and did what we could to support our nation and our way of life. If it would save my nation from dissolution, I would hurl myself under a tank (Tiananmen Square, American style) - with absolutely no hesitation - and, in the process, gladly die for the continuation of the principles for which so many American citizen-soldiers have died defending.

Michael Kinsley needs to climb down from his penthouse office at the Time And Life Building, Rockefeller Center in New York and talk to some actual "nativists," those whose depths of patriotism he challenges. Those who tunnel under or jump over our borders and (let’s give them the benefit of the doubt here) seek employment to work among the legal residents of the United States do not, by simply standing on American soil, suddenly develop any degree of loyalty for this country. It is not love for this country or its people that illegal immigrants "[do] our dirty work under constant fear of eviction, getting thrown out and returning again and again." It is, if truth be told, because the money is good and the benefits are better than in their native countries. That and the fact that being "evicted" is about as traumatic as finding your car windshield sporting a parking ticket.

If, on the other hand, our laws were actually enforced and criminals were justly punished for breaking our laws (by, say, illegally crossing our borders without earning documentation through "due process") and the illegal immigrants kept "returning again and again," does that - in any sense - prove any shred of "patriotism"? How, precisely, does being a repeat offender serve as proof of devotion to American principles? Illegal immigrants repeat their crimes not because of an overwhelming flag-waving loyalty and devotion to America ideals but because it has no deterrent. Illegal immigrants do not stop their behavior for the same reasons that most of the current crop of children thumb their noses at their teachers, policemen and their parents: because they have not been sufficiently discouraged from this behavior. Adequate disincentives would be easy enough: In the case of illegal immigrants, imprisonment and deportation; in the instance of children, corporal (not a "time out" in their rooms or loss of cell phone privileges) punishment.

B.F. Skinner taught us long ago that, with a sufficient behavioral consequence, most negative behaviors can be modified and, often, eliminated. Most sensible people do not act on impulse. For example, I periodically have the almost overwhelming urge to knock Michael Kinsley’s fool head off his shoulders and place it on a pike atop the Brooklyn Bridge. I don’t act on this, not because of some moral fiber that prohibits such intraspecies brutality but because if one acted on this understandable impulse to make the world a better place, they would be imprisoned and, in some enlightened states, deprived of their right to continue breathing. I say "most people" because there are a minority of humans who will rape, pillage and plunder for no better reason than that they might get away with it. But laws, when equally, justly and adequately enforced, will deter uncivilized behavior in the majority of our species.

However, "paper laws" - as opposed to laws that are enforced and prosecuted - are not deterrents at all. They do not discourage negative behavior. Nor do they, when broken repeatedly, provide evidence of how patriotic one might be. Repeatedly breaking the law does not signify fervent love of "American values". If one follows Kinsley’s logic (if you can call it that), incorrigible rapists are only showing "gumption" and merely "the most willingness to risk all to get"...well, let’s keep it PG here. What repeat offenders give proof of is that those who persist in breaking the law place no value in law and are recalcitrant criminals.

To equate the intentions and motivation of illegal immigrants with "love of America," as Michael Kinsley does, is as absurd and irresponsible a display of looney liberalism as I can imagine.