All politics is local, true, but the top issues I mentioned in my earlier post are all national in scope. I'm not trying to diminish the importance of illegal immigration. It needs to be addressed. I wish Bush would address it in a realistic way. But faced with the other issues we're facing, I can't say it's a make-or-break issue for me.
Your opnion is shared by many. I've always recognized the position but attributed it to a lack of knowledge to the depth of the problem in California. Here are some things to ponder.
In March of this year every other child born in California was classifed as "Hispanic". That's 50% of all new births that were recorded. Based on a rather stable demographic of 15% from 1900 until WWII is can be justifiably assumed that approximately 85% of these children are a direct result of illegal immigration into the US since 1950. According to California government statistics, appromximately 38% of all California, public school pupils were "Hispanic" in the 2001-2002 school year. That indicates that approximately 1/3 of the public school population in California was directly attributable to illegal immigration. That equates to a budget cost of approximately $14B this school year for K-post secondary public education.
The legal system is running at about 25%, that's about $2B and the saftey nets at roughly 35%-40% principally through children's linkage. That's another $11B. That's approximately 1/3 of the budget directed toward the consequences of illegal immigration in the last 50 years.
Three trends are troubling. While immigratnts have moved freely across California's boarders since statehood, the advent of "corporate farming", after WWII, began causing am imbalance in what had been a seasonal cycle of migration and repatriation of male workers.
Beginning in about the 1970's these immigrants began finding stable, year round employment in the services industries. Today California agriculture employs only about 10% of these immigrants. With stable employment in the services industry came the justification for these traditionally male workers to bring their families along.
Birth rates among these immigrants are about 2 1/2 greater than the prevailing US average. As US birth rates have declined these elevated rates among recent, Mexican immigrants have continued for at least 3 generations. Today California is experienceing an explosion in "Hispanic" births comparative to the native popultion and the trend is obvious in the school poulation statistics.
Last but not least, these poorly educated, less skilled newcommers take more in services than they pay in taxes. The more educated each succesive generation becomes, statistically, the more of a drain they represent because they seek employment in the public sector.
Think about it.:)