Doing Jobs Republicans Won't Do

Front Page Magazine ^ | 26 Dec 06 | Robert Stacy McCain

[rellimpank]

If defeated Republicans like Ohio Sen. Mike DeWine and Rhode Island Sen. Lincoln Chafee want to know why “Reagan Democrats” turned against them in 2006, they ought to think back to May 25.

That’s the day DeWine, Chafee and 21 other Republican senators voted yes for S. 2611, the “comprehensive” immigration reform bill. The message was loud and clear: The Republican Party did not give a damn about the American worker.

It was hardly surprising, then, that when Election Day rolled around, the American worker declared he did not give a damn about the Republican Party.

On May 25, a few brave souls tried to talk sense to the fanatics who rammed S. 2611 through the Senate. “We will never solve the problem of illegal immigration by rewarding those who break our laws,” said Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina .

[Lurker]

The Republican 'leadership', and I use that term very, very loosely, has no one but themselves to blame for the November elections results.

L

[wideawake]

FPM is a little heavy on the socialism today. Viva la worker's revolution indeed.

[rellimpank]

--I agree totally--

[johnny7]

Instead of using this hand-grenade in 2006... they decided to sit on it.

[DJ Taylor]

When I read this in this morning's paper, I knew the Democrats had finally found an issue that could propel them into the White House in 2008, Illegal Immigration. Fromma Harrop is probably one of the most flaming liberal journalists one can find in any of the the local fish wraps, and when she writes a piece like this, it's a definite indication of which way the Democrats are heading.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: A RICH AMERICAN'S GAME

There's a popular game in America that goes, I'll cut your wages, but you don't cut mine. And the outsourcing of your factory job to China is a good thing, because it makes my paycheck go further at Wal-Mart. We hear this theme a lot in the debate over illegal immigration.

Consider the recent raids on Swift meat-processing plants. Federal agents arrested 1,187 illegal immigrants at facilities in six states. Mere hours later, economists warned that depriving the industry of illegal labor could raise hamburger prices.

Illegal immigration is usually presented as a win-win situation: Undocumented foreigners earn far more than they could back home. Consumers get a bargain.

Nowhere to be seen are America's working poor who get stomped on 13 different ways. They have to compete with illegal immigrants for jobs and housing. Low-skilled natives and legal immigrants also end up subsidizing the undocumented because they tend to live in the same communities, which must provide hospitals, police, schools and garbage pickup.

Who doesn't suffer from illegal immigration? For starters, the people who write about it. I speak of the journalism profession, which has the habit of covering the issue by anecdotes. Reporters thrive on sympathetic stories about illegal immigrants who work hard and go to church.

But, were a busload of illegals from Australia to turn up at their newspaper and offer reportage at 10 percent below the going rate, the writers would call the authorities so fast that your head would spin. And the publisher's argument that thanks to the cheap Australians, he's able to trim a few cents off the newsstand price would make no impression.

As it turns out, the meat-processing companies that employ so many illegal immigrants have been enjoying a nearly 50-percent discount on what was the going rate. In 1980, the average meat-processing job paid $19 an hour. The companies then moved their plants to rural areas, far from the Midwest cities and their unions. The industry's wages now average about $9 an hour.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce likes to wail about the "labor shortage." It says there aren't enough chambermaids, dishwashers, etc. to work for its members at lousy wages. Odd, but when there's a shortage of labor -- or anything else -- doesn't the price of it go up? The price of unskilled labor in the United States hasn't gone up. It's gone down. Because of immigration, American-born high-school dropouts experienced a 5-percent loss in wages during the '80s and '90s, according to a study by Harvard economist George Borjas.

For some reason, the job of keeping prices low has fallen entirely on the shoulders of the most vulnerable Americans. If we banged down CEO compensation and sliced lawyers' pay by a third, the same thing would happen. Everyone's prices would drop. The corporation could sell its products for less, and the cost of legal services would fall.

No vocation keeps a tighter lid on immigration than the medical profession. "If we let in 100,000 immigrant doctors," Richard Freeman, another Harvard economist, recently told a group of journalists, "everyone in this room would benefit." Except the American doctors.

Suggest a U.S. labor policy that depresses professional pay as a means of keeping prices in check, and you get laughed out of the room. But say that sitting on the wages of unskilled factory workers stems inflationary pressure -- a frequently made argument -- and the PhDs quietly nod in agreement.

And that's how the game is played. High pay for me. Low pay for you. The folks at the economic bottom are obviously not making the rules.

[gas0linealley]

Great article, especially this:

"It was hardly surprising, then, that when Election Day rolled around, the American worker declared he did not give a damn about the Republican Party."

[rellimpank]

--saw that somewhere else in the last week too--I was stating a couple of years ago that the Demotraitors would steal the immigration issue.

Now that here are enough illegals already here to make the Demo's the majority for another forty years, they'll "do" something about it---

[DJ Taylor]

Here's the Democrat plan, as I see it. Illegal aliens, as yet, don't have a right to vote in our elections, so they don't count in the Democrat plan for 2008. However, after the Democrats use the control/stop Illegal alien issue to capture the White House in 2008, just watch them draw those illegal aliens into their flock as legal residents beholden to the Democrats for their status as American citizens and voting Democrats.

You don't have to be a Nostradamus to see this one coming; the handwriting is on the wall.

[rellimpank]

--yep--but I suspect all the "amnesty" group that want to will find a way to vote in '08 and it won't be Repub---

[gas0linealley]

What is your opinion of the article you posted. Do you agree with it?

[gubamyster]

ping

[SoFloFreeper]

That’s the day DeWine, Chafee and 21 other Republican senators voted yes for S. 2611, the “comprehensive” immigration reform bill. The message was loud and clear: The Republican Party did not give a damn about the American worker...

That may have been the perception, but it wasn't the case: a majority of the Republican Senators voted against S. 2611...I wish we had a stronger immigration stand, yes, and I hope the party learns from it.

But this reasoning is faulty; a huge majority of the Democrat senators voted YES on S. 2611, and the American voters re-elected them with extreme prejudice.

Though I do believe many conservative voters DID stay home (at least in part) because of the immigration issue.

[nyconse]

Democrats can vote this way and not lose votes...however, Republicans can not period. In my opinion immigration is the issue of the day and may spawn a third party.

[Dane]

LOL! This article is the epitomie of the term "head in the sand".

To the writer of this article, Dewine and Chafee were replaced by even more liberal candidates.

[gcruse]

"Now that here are enough illegals already here to make the Demo's the majority for another forty years, they'll "do" something about it---"

When the republicans controlled all three branches of govt, they did nothing about it. Are the dems, controlling only Congress, going to succeed where the majority repubs failed? What does that say about republicans?

[OKIEDOC]

The defeat of the Republicans in the November elections can be laid directly at the feet of Republican elitism.

Hard to blame voters who thought replacing arrogant Republican lawmakers who repeatedly broke their word to the once loyal marching in step voters.

I have often stated on many occasions that Democrat leaders are nothing but muck divers in the cesspool of American politics, maybe that now applies to some so called Republican leaders.

Well it seems to me that I can without equivocation or mental reservation state that it is also housecleaning time in the Republican Party.

Its time for the turncoats and John Kerry wannabes of the Republican party to go away or else get political religion and morph back into what they were supposed to be in the first place, the peoples politicians, strongly working to shore up traditional America.

Not a politician who will sell America and its workers for maybe a potential voter that will turn on them for any commie liberal idea in a New York minute.

Whom can blame Rudy and others lack of commitment as potential candidates, for temporarily abandoning the stinking shape of the ship of Republican politics?

For many of our party and us we voted for President Bush values twice as we could not stomach a commie, cowardly, traitor like John Kerry for president or an ego maniac such as Alvin (I Invented Weird Science) Gore..

This last election we did not have to make that choice and everyone knows to wake up Washington you have to send a very loud and clear message.

Reminds us of the animal rights Berzerkly, California city dude who asked the farmer how he got his donkeys attention.

The farmer walked around, picked up a 2 X 4 about 4 feet long and bashed the donkey right between the eyes.

The farmer stated to the aghast dude “that’s how you get a Dumb Asses attention”.

Seems to me the American voter hit the Republican Elephant right where the calf don’t suck and lets hope it got our so called leaders attention.

[lowbridge]

bump

[Pelham]

When the Democrats beat the GOP with this stick it will be because the la raza Republicans handed it to them.