THE ANSWER to Rhode Island’s illegal-immigration problem is to simply start discriminating against illegal immigrants. To understand this solution we must first set aside our predispositions regarding the word “discrimination.”

The word “discrimination” has become codified into political jargon — thought by liberals to be even uglier than its cousins “prejudice,” “profiling” and “polarization.” The mindless railing against discrimination is often done to imply the righteousness of leftist agendas. But while liberals speak of discrimination as an absolute evil, society sanctions and practices it on a daily basis.

The very nature of legislation is to discriminate. Just as almost every joke will offend someone, every law will discriminate against someone. A law that prohibits murder discriminates against the murderer. The Constitution discriminates against millions of people under the age of 35, who cannot be president. And yes, laws regarding illegal immigration discriminate against illegal immigrants.

Therefore, when Governor Carcieri issued his executive order to uphold federal immigration laws he was rightfully calling for discrimination against illegal immigrants.

The Rhode Island left wishes nothing more than for this controversy to be viewed in the simple context of good against evil, or bigotry versus tolerance. But the debate over the state’s immigration policy has nothing to do with such a contest. Nor is it a battle against discrimination. It is a matter of exactly whom is going to be discriminated against — tax-paying Rhode Islanders, or the state’s illegal population.

Consider the words of state Sen. Juan Pichardo (D.-Providence) regarding his legislative campaign to insulate illegal immigrants from legal authority: “The Rhode Island we want for our children . . . is one that values all individuals rather than promotes discrimination based on real or perceived immigration status. . . . This campaign will prevent legislating discrimination.”

The irony has yet to occur to Pichardo. His legislative campaign blatantly discriminates against Rhode Islanders who foot the bill for this part of the state’s list of high expenditures.

Do not expect an end to the distortion, smears and lies made about the governor and his vast majority of supporters. One pro-illegal-immigration activist publicly called Rhode Islanders for Immigration Law Enforcement a “white supremacist organization.” And a recent press release declared that the governor’s crackdown on illegal immigration was creating “a Rhode Island where because of your accent, the color of skin or your country of heritage you may be denied access to education, housing and work.” These remarks are made incessantly in the face of the reality that the only factor that will ever cause the denial of work or public services is one’s legal status.

Despite the exhaustive efforts to articulate the various economic reasons for practicing strict immigration enforcement, the Rhode Island left insists on ignoring them, and instead chooses to habitually dumb down our civil discourse by blaming the controversy on the deep-rooted racism within the state’s white majority. The advocacy group We Can Stop the Hate R.I. could not more perfectly exhibit this propaganda right there in the name of its organization. And the ACLU’s Steven Brown cautioned that the decision to crack down on illegal immigration would only “increase the element of xenophobia as presently exists in Rhode Island.” For liberals, everything can be boiled down to racism.

Yet, it is not the fault of the objective observer that the large majority of Rhode Island’s illegal population has migrated from the same region and speaks the same language, Spanish. Still, there are some who strive to enforce the impression that the governor’s executive order is aimed at citizens of Hispanic heritage, rather than the state’s costly illegal population.

But the governor is not dealing with people who even care to acknowledge this distinction. At their pre-arranged press conference the other week activists of the Rhode Island left chanted, “All Human Beings Are Legal!”

It is important to understand the ideology and mindset of the Rhode Island left, those who echo mindless talking points about “discrimination,” “hate” and “xenophobia” — those who proclaim themselves the arbiters and champions of “fairness,” “justice,” “respect” and “civil rights.”

A radical can be defined as an individual who not only espouses thought that is foreign to mainstream sentiments, but in addition to his extreme views is willing to skirt standing law to achieve his objectives — an individual who cares little that democratic law is the defender of liberty. We find such people on the pro-illegality side of our current immigration debate, within activist organizations and the legislature.

Senator Pichardo has been joined by eight other Democratic lawmakers in his legislative campaign to bestow total benefits and rights upon all individuals — “regardless of immigration status.” Their agenda defies current federal law by calling for the issuing of drivers’ licenses to illegal aliens, by inoculating the illegal population against employment standards, and by forbidding landlords and employers from inquiring about one’s immigration status.

Among Pichardo’s battalion are Reps. David Segal (D), Grace Diaz (D), Joseph Almeida (D), Elizabeth Denigan (D), Thomas Slater (D), Sens. Harold Metts (D), Charles Levesque (D) and Maryellen Goodwin (D). Not to be forgotten is Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts (D), who referred to the governor’s executive order as “the politics of polarization.” Oh, God help us.

This group’s campaign even calls for the expansion of more pricey social benefits for illegal aliens, and defies the implementation of the federal E-Verify program. It is an all-out radical strategy that would make it virtually impossible to make determinations of legal standing, thereby forming a more closed society in which no hard statistics concerning illegal immigration can ever be collected. This condition would kill the state’s capacity to make an exact assessment of the monetary impact illegal immigration has on Rhode Island’s annual budget.

It is now an inescapable reality: Some of our elected representatives are disregarding the will of a silent majority, drafting bills that flout federal rulings and acting as accomplices to those who evade the law. Their actions and sentiments are nothing less than a reckless declaration of war against the rule of law, a condemnation of the prosecution of an individual based on even his “real . . . immigration status” (read: illegal).

Rhode Island is not just dealing with a costly illegal-immigration problem, but also with a radical political machine. Make no mistake about the philosophy or the intentions of the Rhode Island left. These people are not merely liberals rushing to the defense of those they view as downtrodden. They are a body of radicals who hold contempt for legal authority, believe all humans have a birthright to American citizenship, and are trying to pass legislation intended to help illegal immigrants escape the rule of law.

The consequences for their radical politics should be nothing short of motions made for impeachment and recall elections.

Travis Rowley ( trowley@idiversity.org). is vice chairman of the Rhode Island Young Republicans and author of Out of Ivy.