McCain slams GOP foes on immigration (Giuliani and Romney)

....and chastised them for not offering their own proposals to deal with illegal immigration.

The "proposal" for "dealing with illegal immigration" has been in front of your face for years, Senator McCain.
Here are the main ingredients:

1. Build a long, strong, effective fence.
2. Increase border patrols and assure that agents have real enforcment power. (No "catch and release", etc.)
3. DENY illegal aliens access to any government services, including schools. Require mandatory, automatic deportation of any illegal alien who attempts to access any government service, whether such service is federal, state, or local. (Note: The only exception would be dire-emergency medical treatment, followed immediately after sufficient recovery time by mandatory, automatic deportation.)
4. REQUIRE a JAIL sentence of at least three months for any illegal alien found to be holding fraudulent identification, followed by mandatory, automatic deportation. (Note: Lengthier jail sentences would be required for the "identity theft" of living American citizens.)
5. Require fines and criminal proceedings against any employer (including company officers and responsible hiring personnel) who knowingly hires and employs illegal aliens.
6. "Anchor babies" (babies born to illegal alien parents) are to be DENIED citizenship, and are to be immediately deported along with their parents. (Note: This provision should be made retroactive, say, sixteen years.)
7. Any law enforcement officer (federal, state, or local) who becomes aware of an illegal alien's status is REQUIRED to notify the appropriate federal authorities immediately and hold that alien in custody for no more than three days (sufficient time for federal authorities to take custody).

The above seven provisions, if passed, will fully resolve the illegal alien problem. Illegals will disappear by attrition since they will be unemployable, unable to access government welfare and other services, and unable to enroll their illegal alien children in government schools.

Meanwhile, reasonable LEGAL immigration laws can be strengthened, streamlined, and ENFORCED to address the needs of employers.

Problem solved. Now, get right on it, Senator.
Hustle.

Actually if the laws are enforced, then there would be no problem.

I see this response over and over. How long does it take for the fact to sink in that the current laws are unenforceable? It's not some kind of lack of will or a grand conspiracy. It's just not possible for existing law to work.

Fact 1: It is impossible to "close" the border. Yes, we can make it harder for people to sneak in. But it will prove impossible to totally close it. Note the dozens of tunnels dug under the wall in So.Cal. Also note the impossibility of eliminating drugs, despite decades of the "war on drugs".

Fact 2: It is virtually impossible to hold an employer to account for hiring illegals. That's because our ID system allows easy forgery, and an employer can't be prosecuted because he can't detect the forgery. The only cases that have been successfully brought against employers are the very few cases where they actually helped illegals come up with bogus ID.

Fact 3: The Constitution does not allow rounding up people off the street and forcing them to present ID to prove they're legal. And I'm glad for that, because I don't want to be stopped, and perhaps a mistake on my ID put me in jail.

Fact 4: The Democrats run the Congress, and they're totally open borders people. We will get no new law from the Congress except via compromise with them. Compromise is a long held American tradition. For example the fact that we have a House and Senate, a two body legislature, was one of the first grand compromises under the Constitution.

Fact 5: Next year is an election year. We have to do something *this* year, or forget it. Congressmen will have no bravery to do what's necessary against even a minority of people mad at them over something.

Fact 6: The tendency is for the parties to swap the White House, so likely the Dems will win next year no matter who runs on either side. If the Dems win it, they'll totally open the borders, or best case, do nothing, and we'll continue to increase the illegal population by hundreds of thousands a year.

The bottom line, we need this legislation. If we support the Republicans trying to write it, we have a better chance of getting a better compromise with the Democrats. If we fight the Republicans on this, it will weaken their hand in Congress and we end up with a worse deal. Just like it's necessary to support our troops in battle, it's necessary to support our troops in Congress, even if what they do appears imperfect. I trust George Bush on this issue, because he's doing exactly what he said he would do about immigration when he ran in 2000. I trust Jon Kyl on this issue, because I think he's the most honorable man of either party in the Congress. They say we need this. I'm not there, they are, I trust them to do the best thing.

How long does it take for the fact to sink in that the current laws are unenforceable?

They are unenforced because the political will to enforce them is lacking. Presidents from Harding to Eisenhower enforced the laws effectively, and illegal immigration was not a major problem. Even during the massive immigration wave of 1890-1914, health standards for incoming immigrants were strictly enforced, with those having communicable diseases quarantined before leaving Ellis Island. (Remember the scene from Godfather II, where a young Vito Corleone was quarantined.) During the post-World War I Red scare, aliens who were associated with Communist and anarchist groups were expelled, including Emma Goldman. In the Eisenhower Administration, Operation Wetback resulted in the deportation of 80,000 Mexican illegals and an estimated 500-700,000 people who voluntarily returned to Mexico.

What has happened from the 1960s onward is the effect of liberalism and "white guilt" encouraged by the liberal media and the educational establishment. From the Johnson Administration onward, no government has had the desire to effectively enforce the law. The hands of the Border Patrol are tied, and noncitizens, indeed people in this country in violation of the law, are given in effect the same measure of civil rights citizens have. Irrespective of the measures to curb continued illegal immigration in this proposed bill, they will not be enforced. The net result of this bill will be to place 12-20 million people on the voter rolls. This will ensure that the Democrats will be entrenched in the White House and Congress, and the GOP will be totally RINOized, as has happened in California with Schwarzenegger. Then in a few years, the next batch of illegals will be effectively made citizens.

The proposal supported by the President and turncoats such as Kyl, McCain, and Specter will ensure permanent Democratic majorities. We will have completed the journey from freedom to serfdom, and even the concept of American nationality and culture will be gone as we become a Third World amalgam.

No compromise, no surrender. We need no Quislings or Petains, but men of the caliber of George Washington or Andrew Jackson. This is not a bill for highways or dams, or raising the minimum wage. The stakes are too high.

They are unenforced because the political will to enforce them is lacking.

Well, that's all I read of your post because you are incorrect. The enforcement that matters is preventing employers from hiring illegals, and that can't be done with existing ID requirements. What worked in the past is in the past. The smuggling infrastructure didn't exist in previous generations, and the legal climate was different. Neither of those things will be fixed simply because someone "has the political will" to do it. It takes new laws, and that's exactly what Bush is trying to do, with no help from conservatives.

Republicans are the stupid party. Not the elected officials, I'm talking about the rank and file. Stupid. I'm embarrased to associate with them, for the first time in 20 years. I've been taking the arguments of the lefties at work with a bit more weight (except about Iraq).

And people wonder why the R's lost in 2006. And, no, it wasn't because of Iraq. That's just post-election Democrat spin.

...you are incorrect (that the political will to enforce existing laws is lacking).

Unfortunately for you, the facts support my position. Below are the results of a study prepared by a pro-illegal immigration group called Third Way. My source is CNN, (http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/05/25/immigration.enforcement.ap/index.html), a news outfit hardly considered part of the VRWC.

"Among the report's findings:

Apprehensions on the Southwest border have declined by 350,000 per year, almost 30 percent from the Clinton years.

The number of deportable aliens found at the northern border and border locations other than the Southwest has dropped by almost 40 percent.

Although the number of immigration-related arrests at the workplace has risen each year since 2003, 84 percent of those are workers rather than employers."

The enforcement that matters is preventing employers from hiring illegals.

I do not doubt that better IDs might help in this matter. However, only a small fraction of illegals work for large companies like IBP or Tyson Foods. Most work for small companies, such as construction contractors, farmers, lawn service firms, etc. Many of these firms are themselves run by aliens, legal or not, or Mexican-Americans, who would tend not to be cooperative unless forced to do so. Others are employed on an individual basis as household help. Even attempting to enforce these laws on tens of thousands of employers would require a massive increase in Federal LEO and civilian staff, far more than the bill will provide. Additionally, do not underestimate the ability of the black market to circumvent the bells and whistles place in the new IDs. It may be costly to the illegal, but many have paid hundreds of dollars to be smuggled across the border and would look on it merely another cost of doing business.

The smuggling infrastructure didn't exist in previous generations

There has been smuggling of contraband, first alcohol during the Prohibition era, then narcotics, for generations. The Mexican political and business elites are not cooperative because their nation's underclass is a ticking time bomb, as was evident during the Mexican Civil War of the 1910s and even the most recent Presidential election, when a Hugo Chavez wannabe received 35% of the vote. Also, confronting the immigration issue means dealing with organized crime, which controls both migrant flow and the narcotics trade. The level of corruption endemic to Mexico makes the police agencies and military unreliable. Many veterans of the Mexican equivalent to the Special Forces and SEALs work for the Mexican Mafia. The only language the Mexican elite will understand is trade sanctions, including revoking the NAFTA treaty. If that is what it takes to force cooperation, so be it.

the legal climate was different.

The cause of the legal climate changing was the rise of liberal social ideology, which overtook our legal system under Earl Warren, the Chief Justice whom Eisenhower acknowledged as his chief mistake while in office, and became dominant in Congress under Lyndon Johnson. (The older liberalism of Roosevelt and Truman was not oriented toward racial, sexual, and ethnic victimhood, but rather focused on capital vs. labor issues.) In effect, judicial rulings and legislation have effectively given aliens, even illegal ones, the same level of legal protection as citizens. We will not reverse this until the Republicans in the White House, the Congress, and the judiciary develop a spine and confront this evil. We need men far more tough minded than George W. Bush, Trent Lott, and Denis Hastert are or have been.

And people wonder why the R's lost in 2006. And, no, it wasn't because of Iraq.

In every election since 1862, the party in power has lost seats in Congress or lost the White House when the Administration has engaged in a no-win war (1952, 1966, 1968, 1970), when battlefield results are not positive (1862, 1942), and when there has been a postwar disenchantment with a war and its outcome (1920). General Patton's statement that Americans love winners and hate losers has held true in electoral politics.

[...you are incorrect (that the political will to enforce existing laws is lacking)].

Unfortunately for you, the facts support my position.

The "facts" you mention do not speak to the matter of whether the existing law is functional. A reduction in arrests could easily be interpreted that the PR of "stricter enforcement" has led many illegals to remain in the US all year, rather than commuting back and forth during the picking season, as was the norm. This is probably a bad result as far as the "anti-illegal" position goes, because illegals staying all year means they set up roots and build up the Hispanic loser unskilled labor culture, which is not a good thing. Better that they come across every year and spend three months picking in the fields and then go home, and we have now prevented that.

Your fact that 84% of workplace arrests have been of illegals, rather than employers, makes my case. It would be impossible to arrest and put in jail 12 million people. But it would be very easy to arrest their employer, if only the existing law didn't give them a get-out-of-jail-free card in the form of non-existent ID. Yes, some illegals do work for fly-by-night illegals themselves. But even in those cases, it's possible to go after who hired the illegal contractor. At some point up the chain would be someone that you could put your hands on and motivate to enforce the law themselves. That is the *only* way to enforce immigration laws in the end, to motivate people to follow the law on their own. Like Income Taxes, that would be unenforceable if every tax payer refused to pay, the system still works because the vast majority of tax payers are afraid to cheat. Employers of illegals must have the same kind of motivation, or the problem will continue forever.

A new law is necessary. Now is the time to do it because it will not be possible next year during the election. And waiting until 2009, when untold millions more illegals will be here, and possible a Democrat in the White House too, is not an option. Any new law will will have "flaws". That's just the way it is, and has always been. Even the founders goofed up on the issue of slavery. Lawmaking truly is like making sausage. You do the best you can, and try not to look at the process too closely.

The numbers speak for themselves. If apprehensions are down under Bush than was the case when Clinton was in office, even as an estimated 1.1 million people are expected to enter the country this year (source: The Federation for American Immigration Reform Web site), vs. 700-800,000 during the Clinton years, there is something seriously wrong with border control.

You stated that legislation is a matter of compromise. However, the current legislation will have the net effect of increasing the number of Democratic voters. Consider that Arizona (to give one example) was won by Bush in 2004 with 210,000 votes. Federal government statistics estimate that there are 400-450,000 illegals in Arizona. If only half of them become voters, and presuming a 4:1 Democratic bias (most immigrants have voted for the Democrats since the days of the Scots-Irish migration two centuries ago), that 210,000 vote margin is almost eliminated. The Legislature, now held by the GOP with narrow margins, would slip over to Democratic control. The current 5:2 Congressional split favoring the Republicans would even out, probably at 4:3.

And this is just one state that has been strongly Republican since World War II. The effects on New Mexico, Colorado, and Nevada, not to mention Florida, would be even more devastating to the GOP. The 1986 amnesty and mini-amnesties since then were a major factor in moving California from a middle of the road state politically to one that is hopelessly liberal.

Of course, the Democrats will deal on this issue. They will be the ultimate winners and will develop a decades long near monopoly on Congressional power, as they had from 1931 to 1981, and from 1987 to 1994. Democratic control of the White House will be the norm. Then, the next amnesty bill will place even more foreigners on the path to citizenship. Happy days are here again, if you are a Democrat.

No compromise, no surrender. The stakes are too high.

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