Posted on 11/04/2003 9:29:11 AM PST by paulklenk
Taking time out from the war on terror and the war on drugs, President Bush, to the purple born, has declared war on cleaning ladies.
The agents of his wrath swooped down on 61 Wal-Mart stores in 21 states where men and women from South America and Eastern Europe toiled at minimum-wage jobs mopping floors and cleaning toilets until Bush closed them down. One wonders if the president remembers the words of the man whom he once cited as his role model: “That which you do to the least of these, you do to me.”
Perhaps the president and all his advisers have forgotten that their ancestors, too, were immigrants who had to struggle to make it in this new land. The fact that their forebears may or may not have come here legally and these plunderers of our national treasure came without sanction of law merely betokens how self-involved we are in our prosperity, narcissistically refusing to share it with those in need.
These men and women now in jail came here seeking work, not welfare. The $11 billion a year Mexican Americans send home to their impoverished nation gives every man, woman and child back home $110 with which to buy food and other necessities. Bush no doubt has no family memories of immigrants who sent money home, but those of us of more recent vintage recall clearly the stories of our fathers and grandfathers. It was that money that allowed our ancestors to survive.
Does Bush seriously contend that, with 6 percent unemployment, there are Americans waiting to take the jobs of those he arrested at Wal-Mart? He knows full well that the alternative to illegal immigrants performing those jobs is to use robots to do it. He has not saved jobs for Americans. He has saved them for robots.
For those in high dudgeon who are reading this column and would intone piously about the rule of law, let me ask if you are sure the toilet you used at the gas station was cleaned by a legal immigrant or a U.S. citizen. How about your garden and lawn? And your housecleaners? And the guy who waits on you at the lunch counter or cleans the dishes after you have eaten? Are those all here legally? I invite you to vindicate your self-righteous views on immigration by mowing your own lawn, cleaning your own toilets and cooking your own food — or do so for $5.25 an hour.
America needs Bush to crack down on illegal immigration, but from nations that harbor terrorists or sponsor them. We need an end to immigrants coming in on student visas from those nations. We must have more aggressive efforts to round up those who have overstayed their visas who hail from lands that wish us no good.
We need an immigration policy along the lines of legislation proposed by Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) that would reward with amnesty and citizenship those who pass certain criteria such as English literacy, no arrest record and employment with contributions to Social Security.
The Republican Party can continue its war on Hispanics and its battles against cleaning ladies if it wants, but it does so at the price of its own electability. What message does the Wal-Mart raid send at a time when Bush is attempting to overcome past GOP insistence on cutoff of aid to legal immigrants by adopting pro-Hispanic policies and appointing top level Hispanics to key jobs?
Americans do not confuse hardworking Mexican and Eastern European immigrants, legal and illegal, with those who come to our nation from nations that sponsor or harbor terrorists. We know that the former build our nation and the latter want to tear it down. Bush does himself and his party no good by attacking the good immigrants and letting the bad ones go free.
came here has [illegal] immigrants.
People from other nations are allowed into this country by operation of law.
When they violate law to get here and/or stay here, they are not "immigrants", they are illegal migrants and nothing more nor less than that.
http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/constitution_transcript.html#1.8
Article I Section. 8.
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow Money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;
To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;
To establish Post Offices and post Roads;
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;
To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;
To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
To provide and maintain a Navy;
To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings;--And
To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.
opportunity Republicans have to recruit life-long loyal members
Immigrate to this nation according to law, there is no problem, anyone who violates that law is not and cannot be a "life-long loyal member".
You get it yet?
$2 billion in CA alone is spent on educating illegal immigrants.
The US is becoming known as a nation with no rule of law, exemplified so clearly in the last few years by a sex-addicted President who tried to circumvent it himself.
And I do not. I'm sure your friends, or many of the illegals I've met are good folks. But I don't want to have 20 million of them here, particularly when the school system is encouraging them to retain their mexican/gautamelan identity and language, or when our court system has determined ballots have to be printed in spanish to comply with the 14th. ammendment.
"but immigration is GREAT for a country..." Tell it to the Native Americans.
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