Posted on 12/17/2004 8:33:59 AM PST by jveritas
In the last few weeks so many threads have been posted on Free Republic regarding the illegal immigration issue. Many of the posters on these threads are not there to discuss the illegal immigration issue in a constructive and logical way, but they have been savagely bashing President Bush and spewing their despise toward him, as bad if not even worse than the most rabid left wing liberals.
The illegal immigration issue is an important discussion forum that we need to debate on FR, but the style and the content of the debate as appeared in many posts have been filled with a despicable hatred toward President Bush.
Many who disagree with President Bush illegal immigration issue are “True Conservatives” and “Faithful Republicans”, but they do it in a constructive criticism rather than hateful speeches. On the other hand, the perpetrators of these hateful posts are the Buchananites and the 3rd party voters.
Illegal immigration is a vital issue that our nation needs to deal with. President Bush has suggested the “Guest Worker Program” which is in some ways a “practical” and “effective” solution to address some but not all of the problems of the 10-15 millions illegal immigrants in the US. However the President still does not address in a clear way what are the effective measures that we need to take to strengthen the control of the Southern borders, and prevent new waves of illegal immigrants coming to the country everyday through the Mexican borders. Also what must be urgently addressed is the abuse perpetuated by many illegal immigrants of states and federal welfare programs. The Guest Worker Program must be very clear that immigrants who are employed under this program are not entitled to welfare help, period.
Now the extreme fringe on FR, want to use the most radical and the dumbest ways to solve the illegal immigration issue. The wackiest of their wacky ideas, is to deport all the illegal immigrants. What a great solution! What this fringe do not take comprehend is that deporting 10 to 15 millions illegal immigrants, require that the states and the federal law enforcement agencies must hire tens of thousand of people and must spend tens if not hundred of billions of dollars to do it, and it will not work. Make no doubt about it that the media will be abusing these scenes of deportation thousand folds than anything they have used and abused in the past. The vast majority of the Americans will not accept days after days of images and videos of the millions of illegal immigrants being put in buses and deported. The courts will be tied up in ten of thousands of cases regarding deporting illegal immigrants and this will cost ten of billions of dollars as well. Eventually, these extreme radical and illogical measures will create a tremendous backlash that will destroy any honest effort to fix the illegal immigration problems.
Another delusional idea to resolve the illegal immigration issue is to heavily fine the businesses who hire illegal immigrants and by doing so these immigrants will return back home because no one is hiring them. WOW! Another genius solution! This idea is as moronic as the deporting the millions of illegal immigrants because it requires tens of thousands of new law enforcement agents and tens of billions of dollars, plus it will be played very badly in the arena of public opinion. Furthermore a very strong sector of the business community will fight it to death and they will not let it happen, period.
In conclusion there is only one logical and practical solution to resolve the illegal immigration problem. Legalize the illegal immigrants via a guest worker program, and at the same type stop new and future waves of illegal immigrants by strongly controlling and tightening the Southern borders.
Enough with the hate Bush threads disguised under the illegal immigration issue. Let us discuss this important issue in an honest, smart, logical and constructive way and let us stop the irrational hateful posts.
O.K then, you resolved the problem. </sarcasm>
I must have stumbled into a Lou Dobbs fest.
As to China, That is a skunk of a different color.
We started out with some good intentions, but the Commie govt. has morphed and now uses capitalism as a funding mechanism. Who would have thunk!
But the worm is turning. It is turning slowly but definitely turning in every way.
We are benefiting from China's cheap goods, whether you care to admit it.
And exporting a few boring bullcrap tech assistance jobs to India is not my idea of a huge or even small impact, when we import far more higher paying profitable jobs. Those exports are coming off the overhead and making companies more efficient. Some have already decided it is not for them.
I see no downside, as the GDP continues to expand.
What worries me, is is the GDP growth stops. Then you can be concerned,but it will not be free trade that causes it. It is protectionism that does that.
No government does what you described without a reason beyond politics and/or stupidity. IMO.
Thus, migrant labor is our policy and has been for two decades. Period. No one has the guts to tell the public.
Look at the talk of a World Migration Organization and the UN, economic diaspora, developing countries' citizens beyond borders, "cheap" labor provided to host countries by source countries' "citizens beyond borders," human rights by the host countries for the source countries' "citizens beyond borders" -- that and the strange behavior by all administrations suggest a few things about migration.
1 - Both the New Democrat (Clinton) Third Way progressives and mainline Republicans support it as part of their globalization agenda
2 - Neither Party has the guts to admit it
3 - President Bush is serious -- "guest workers" is not an amnesty plan (it's a developing country's economic diaspora -- eventually the source country will tax their "citizens' beyond borders" income and the host country's sole benefit will be "cheap" labor).
4 - It's a done deal. Elvis has left the building. The fat lady has sung. No one in Washington has the guts to tell us.
The fine proposal was brought up in a committee hearing. I liked it, because it makes it clear that a law was violated.
You didn't read it. It says a lot more than you're ignoring.
My idea was to fine them, some 5,000 dollars and charge them formally with illegal entry. Suspend the jail sentence in lieu of probation for the duration of the permit or longer, whatever flies in Congress.
This should satisfy all the legal stuff, and provide funding for the effort we are making.
No, it doesn't. When you allow a trespasser to remain, the "fine" is rent. If a trespasser isn't removed then he has kept the gains of his trespass.
Keeping in mind that anyone who is found to be a criminal in Mexico,or has violated other laws in the U.S. will simply be sent back on the spot.
If that was true it would be happening now.
Now, I know that not all illegals are going to start running to the nearest point to get a permit, but eventually they will be forced to on their own volition because without one, they will be most likely unemployed.
What's stopping us from enforcing that law now? Once the Dreier bill passes, employer compliance will be mandatory. Again, there is no reason to legalize a single illegal alien.
There are hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of illegal business operations at the present time. I know of at least 100 in my little area of 15,000 residents, perhaps more. Non of them have fed id's. None of them pay into social security or pay taxes to state or fed. Yet they have anywhere from six to twelve employees. (cash)
This is where your illegals can be found. They are everywhere.
No kidding? Really? Then why is it so hard for our politicians to find them?
It's because many of them are cowards. Yet you think that if you let them compound their cowardice by legalizing illegal aliens they'll wake up one day and enforce laws the don't enforce now?
Failure to control this segment of society will result in failure of any and all immigration plans, including enforcement of existing laws.
This can be controlled though stronger currency controls and other methods. This will raise hell with the drug trade as well.
The failure is current. It's your excuse for advocating amnesty. The rest is talk.
Keep in mind, that this is a work in progress that has been essentially halted by Congressional inaction due to constituency complaints. most of which are coming from illegal advocacy groups, immigrant haters and libertines who are worried the Fed will see what they are really up to.
If you make excuses for not enforcing the law before amnesty, you will make them after.
All have joined forces to fight the so called Bush proposal for their own gratuitous reasons.
That is not what is stopping President Bush. Too voters many in both parties don't want to reward illegal aliens, and he does.
So, as a result, I do not know what we will end up with, but it will be done incrementally and mostly under the table.
That is not a good thing. I think it needs to be hashed out so that a majority supports it. Whatever it takes to get there is fine, but logic and reason need to rule. Not simplistic stuff calling for deportations and detentions that cannot be done and militarized borders.
We don't need militarized borders, but no immigration enforcement will work if deportations are off the table. There must be some deportations or there is no risk in being an illegal alien.
Your plan is fatally flawed. You can't stop a behavior by rewarding it.
Oh, goodie gum drops. I just looked at your home page and saw that Massachusetts flag. Why am I not surprised? Most of the open borders boohoos on this site are from way up in the frozen north. Short of moving to Thule, Greenland, you couldn't be farther from the problem on our border while still remaining in this hemisphere.
The Army sentenced me twice to duty at Fort Devens, in the Masshole People's Republic of Taxachusetts. On both occasions I volunteered for duty on the DMZ in Korea in order to escape. Thank God for the DMZ.
I think Bush believes the majority of the guests would be paying into the system for many years before they can collect anything from the system. While they're paying in, the boomers would be taking out. Simultaneously, our younger workers would be transitioning their contributions to private accounts.
My thought process may be totally off base here, but this is a scenario that might explain the administration's support for the guest worker program. I haven't spent any time crunching the numbers, but if it works out, Bush wouldn't have to raise taxes to pay for the transition to privatization, which his stated position.
We'll see how many million leave once we start. More, certainly, than will leave if we reward them for staying, as you propose.
The process will take several pressures applied simultaneously -- some deportations, removing goodies, employer sanctions -- combined with a pressure release, a legitimate guest worker program with applications from countries of origin. The life of an illegal alien will suddenly become less attractive while the life of a legal guest worker will become more attractive.
Much tighter borders control will drastically reduce the new waves of illegal immigrants. For the illegal immigrant who are here, you have to deal with them through the Guest worker program and other similar measures.
You complain about a few thousand agents we'd need for some reasonable deportations, yet you talk glibly about tighter border control while ignoring the manpower sinkhole you would create there with amnesty.
If you reward the illegals you will do so at the expense of the law abiding worker applicants, and thereby encourage more illegal aliens. This has happened before. This is the reason we have so many illegal aliens now. We watched when it was tried in 1986, when less illegal aliens were amnestied than President Bush is proposing now.
Learn history: you can't discourage illegal behavior by rewarding it.
RE: when we import far more higher paying profitable jobs.
From India? China? Mexicorruption? Dare I ask, like what? I have seen ads recruiting for representatives here to sell Indian-based IT and engineering support. Those are good jobs. Seriously.
Illegal aliens cost the state of California about 9 billion EVERY YEAR they're here. The money, the technology and the ability to deport illegal aliens is available. The only thing missing from the puzzle is the spine of the politicians who refuse to enforce the laws. GWB has had four years to figure something out, and all he's done is invite millions more in. His performance on this most important issue has been total failure.
William is right on this one. You and I have to pay into Social Security for about ten years. A Mexican only has to contribute for 18 months and only has to swear he did so under so many different names and Social Security numbers. There is no real mechanism for knowing whether he's telling the truth.
If you want a real eye opener, drive west from here and check out the post office at Lukeville. Population 3,000, but with 18,000 poat office boxes pulling government checks. Only a token few are bona fide American expatriates living in Rocky Point.
Screwed again.
Given the enactment of guest workers I sincerely believe that after a period of time (one, two years?) the next move is to permit the source country to tax its citizens' beyond borders income. (Given that the source country is a developing country.)
Remittances are a kind of tax now especially "group remittances" that go to government entities in the source country.
I am saying, given the worldwide support for migrant labor, there has to be an economic advantage for the source country's government beyond voluntary remittances. The government will be glad to be rid of the people but they want to get paid -- ostensibly to develop their country. IMO.
As far as payroll tax (social security) goes we already are close to totalization and IMO far more will be paid out to citizens in other countries than they will pay in as guest workers here. IMO.
I do not see the idea of legalizing through temporary work permits as a amnesty. I see it as a parole. I do not view their being here as a threat that requires mass deportations,even if it were possible, and it is not. What it requires is control from both the demand side and the border. It is possible to do this. It is impossible or at the very least improbable that we could do deportations of large numbers for any number of reasons. I have from time to time listed most of them and discussed them in detail and you were on some of those threads, as was Janet and several others like Sabertooth.
Just look at the bone dry fact that currently, on our best day, we can't even keep up with the numbers coming in.
It's been nineteen years since we, the general public, thought we fixed this. I understand the anger and the dismay, but I'll not stand in the way of doing something different, knowing that all we have done has been forestalled by the courts and the court of public opinion.
You may continue to rant and complain, but cooler heads will prevail. Bush will get his reforms, or the next man will, but if we wait until the next man, there will be 20-25 million to deal with. Many of those will have been in country for more than 20 years!
What we want to do is to return the migrant population back to a migrant group and not a group that is trapped in a country that they cannot assimilate into because of unworkable laws and disinterested State and local LEO supported by courts who grant them legal protection from deportation.
It is mid December, and most migrants in a normal situation would be going home or Christmas to return in the spring in most areas.
Many will try to do just that and will be doing the loop D' loop with border authorities to return.
They will eventually succeed. They have to.
Their survival and families are depending on them.
If you do not solve this problem from the demand side, the underground economic world that they work in, you will never control illegal immigration from any country, not just Mexico.
This unseen and undocumented economy exists because we do not have a way to know where and who they are.
The illegal will tell us that when the apply for the permit to continue their work. They will say who pays them, how much and what they do, where the business is located and the phone number, the contacts, the network.
It is the only way we will find out and that we can take steps to legalize of close these operations. Most of them are considered legitimate in the areas where they operate, so this is really stirring up a hornets nest of complaints. This is why there is so much resistance.
I really envy Bush for taking this on. He has some major courage to do this, and I for one will support him, because these illegal businesses make it hard for entrepreneurs like myself to make a profit legally.
Cleanup the underground, and you solve the illegal problem from the demand side of the equation.
In return for this information, we grant them parolee legal status. Assuming they still have a job to go to, they can work without fear of being screwed. They can go home for the off season and not be required to stay year round and suck of of social services. They can return to being migrant workers.
That is all I got to say.
Apologies in advance for grammatical error, I am too tired to proof.
OK Lou. :-) LOL
jveritas: "BWAAHHHHHHH. Operation what? Where did you get this from?"
Google is your friend...5,740 references to "Operation Wetback". See:
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=GGLD,GGLD:2004-19,GGLD:en&q=Operation+Wetback
What have you countered? You post things that aren't true and are refuted. Your followups are nonresponsive.
It's been nineteen years since we, the general public, thought we fixed this. I understand the anger and the dismay, but I'll not stand in the way of doing something different, knowing that all we have done has been forestalled by the courts and the court of public opinion.
You are advocating we repeat a mistake, not doing something different.
If you do not solve this problem from the demand side, the underground economic world that they work in, you will never control illegal immigration from any country, not just Mexico.
This unseen and undocumented economy exists because we do not have a way to know where and who they are.
The illegal will tell us that when the apply for the permit to continue their work. They will say who pays them, how much and what they do, where the business is located and the phone number, the contacts, the network.
Do you read at all?
We have the ability to find out where the illegals are working through the workplace verification program. You don't need to legalize them to find out.
If you want to solve the problem from the demand side, then all that needs to be done is inhibit demand for illegal aliens while fostering the supply of legal guest workers.
we grant them parolee legal status.
Another tortured analogy. When you parole criminals do you let them return to the scene of the crime?
Illegal aliens are trespassers. You want to legalize their trespass. This has been tried before and it failed, because it rewards the trespass. This is a historical fact that you have yet to address in any substantive way.
Do you have another name which you prefer?
How about quasi-felon? or semi-felon? or partial felon?
That's really ridiculous!
They've broken our laws. A felon by any other name is still a felon.
This problem is not going to be addressed seriously without blood being shed, and it will not be the illegals who shed this blood.
jveritas:
Why not just defer to the experts at the Center for Immigration Studies, since your own solution to your hand-wringing question appears to be “guest worker” programs.
You are aware that "guest workers" can’t change employers, right? Which puts them one step above slaves. Great for big bidness, bad deal for the taxpayers who subsidize them with health care, welfare, and education for their children.
Here’s a good website to bookmark;
http://cis.org/articles/2001/blueprints/toc.html
I hope you’ll actually spend some time there, and read the articles:
“The purpose of immigration is to create Americans.” ~Mark Krikorian
-and I might add; The purpose of a guest worker program is to create indentured servants, who are subsidized cheap labor for big business and agriculture, and have no vested interest in the future of this country. The article related to that is here:
http://www.cis.org/articles/2001/back801.html
Just stepping over the border isn't considered a felony crime. That's just the fact --- I'm not sure most are charged with misdemeanors even if caught --- most that chose voluntary departure aren't given a trial --- which is why voluntary departure is smart for them to do. Then they're just given a ride back to the border.
Bush repeatedly stated during his campaign, that if a bill reforming campaign finances was approved by Congress he would sign it, and sign it he did.
That's not a betrayal, people who believe that to be a betrayal either didn't pay attention to what Bush was saying, or are disingenuous.
Bush also said pretty much what he wanted to do about the issue of illegal aliens on our soil, again, if you are surprised by what he's trying to do is only because you haven't been paying attention to what the man has been saying all along.
That's not a betrayal either...you may not AGREE with what he's doing, but it's far from a betrayal.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.