Posted on 01/23/2006 7:32:54 AM PST by devane617
Arizona business and political backers of a guest worker program for immigrants wishing to work in the U.S. are getting some top-level backing.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is teaming with top labor unions, other business interests and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in support of a guest worker program and legal way for undocumented workers already in the U.S. to stay in the country.
Arizona Sen. John McCain and Congressmen Jeff Flake and Jim Kolbe, as well as the Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry, are top pushers of a controversial guest worker program.
Joining the U.S. Chamber in favor a proposal put forward by McCain, Flake, Kolbe and U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) are the Service Employees International Union, the Laborers International Union, the American, bishops group and the American Health Care Association. The Arizona state chamber also backs that guest worker effort.
Those groups do not support a more get-tough immigration package put forward by Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl and Texas Sen. John Cornyn, both Republicans. That measure includes a guest worker program but requires the estimated 11 million illegals already in the U.S. to return to their native countries and reapply for legal status.
Kyl's rival in this year's election, Democratic real estate executive Jim Pederson, supports the McCain-Kennedy bill.
McCain-Kennedy requires illegals in the U.S. to pay a fine and undergo criminal and medical background checks and allows them to reapply for status.
The Republican National Committee (RNC) officially endorsed a guest worker program on Friday. President Bush also backs a temporary worker program.
Some other unions, however, including the AFL-CIO, worry about a large-scale guest worker program displacing U.S. jobs in favor of less expensive immigrant labor.
Other heavyweight business interests backing guest worker include the Travel Industry Association of America, Ford Motor Co., Eastman Kodak, DaimlerChrysler and the California Chamber of Commerce.
Business and unions backers of McCain-Kennedy face skepticism from conservatives who passed a get-tough immigration measure late last year without a guest worker plan. Conservatives such as Scottsdale Congressman J.D. Hayworth want border enforcement shored up and tougher penalties against employers who hire illegals put in place before a guest worker package is considered.
West Valley Congressman Trent Franks said Thursday he wants the U.S. Senate to approve the House's enforcement bill and then a guest worker plan can be considered separate from that.
Illegal immigration and border security are top economic and political issues in Arizona and other border states. Key industries rely heavily on migrant and immigrant labor but Franks and others worry terrorists will try or already are trying to enter the U.S. via the Southwestern border with Mexico for a domestic attack.
Mexican speaking?
Now, they have their own language? I always thought they spoke Spanish?
sw
"If that doesn't sound racist to you, then you've got a problem."
Yeah, I've got a big problem alright, it is called Patriotism and belief in the principles that make law. What part of "illegal immigration" don't you get? You've got a problem if you have a love for capitulating, spineless politicians. You've got a bigger problem if you feel absolved of your guilt in being unprincipled by inferring bigotry. Share it with the Rainbow Coalition, not FReep'ers.
Everybody was doing it. It was the "in" thing. The good, old, outpatient, icepick lobotomy.
In other words because illegal aliens wouldn't abide by the orginal laws let's change them to make things easier. How wonderful you are wanting to be so flexible and all to lawbreakers
Teddy Kennedy thanks you.
A social liberal can always be identified regardless of party registration. Confounding basic anthropology, substituting well worn red herrings and then mixing in a tortured suggestion of racism is a sure sign.
If a Republican, these subscribers are welcome because they add flavor to the forum and provide its conservative members with live fire practice. Keep weaving and dodging but always wave the banner high. Social conservatives enjoy the pursuit and an agile adversary is difficult to recruit.
Would you agree that by implementing your above idea would cause many to self deport?
Are you joking?
Does Bush's chest swell with pride when he talks about the "new Americans"?
| We are now one of the largest Spanish-speaking nations in the world. We're a major source of Latin music, journalism and culture. Just go to Miami, or San Antonio, Los Angeles, Chicago or West New York, New Jersey ... and close your eyes and listen. You could just as easily be in Santo Domingo or Santiago, or San Miguel de Allende. For years our nation has debated this change -- some have praised it and others have resented it. By nominating me, my party has made a choice to welcome the new America. George Bush from a campaign speech in Miami, August 2000. |
What is your goal? An America where a hundred languages are spoken driving a wedge between every faction? An America that isn't quite "chocolate" but rather a nice shade of brown?
Do you have a heritage you wish to see survive or are you all for supplanting two hundred years of heritage with another?
Why should we give in?
That's very true. So, everytime I hear that someone is "thinking" about running, talking with the family etc., like Kerry, I know that it's bull. They're floating a balloon, seeing how much behind the scenes cash they can get pledged. No money, no campaign.
The heritage I have is a country that has always welcomed newcomers. And then assimilated them into the "American" culture. What's the problem with keeping that heritage?
My main point is that the option of deporting 10 million people is not an option. It will never happen politically, not because the left has the ability to stop it, but because not even the right wants it enough to fight for it.
So if we're not going to deport all those people, what is the next best thing? I think some combination of carrot (a guest worker program of some kind) and stick (border enforcement and employer/employee sanctions) is the answer. The goal should be to make it easier for a foreign worker to work legally, than illegally. They *are* going to work, so let's bring them into the system somehow.
For those that stay, we should insist they learn English, and study US history in school to complete the assimilation into the "American" culture.
Where am I going wrong?
These two elitist nihilistic establishment parties will no longer control me by saying I"m wasting my vote.
The only ones wasting their vote is the ones who keep voting for these two gluttonous self -serving pigs and hoping for change.
If you vote for the lesser of "two evils" you have still voted for "evil."
I'm going to do what I did years ago when I "fired" the Democratic party when they openly sought the queer vote at their convention.
I'm going to "fire" these people, who seem hell bent into turning what was once the greatest most powerful industrial nation the world has ever seen into an also ran Global bump in the road township, and start hiring some third party and hope some of the others wise up and join me before they wake up in France on the Mississippi.
Mccain is a loose phaser...
You keep neglecting/ignoring/forgetting a word here...let me help.
The heritage I have is a country that has always welcomed newcomers ILLEGALS. And then assimilated segregated them into the "American" isolated Ghetto-ized culture. What's the problem with keeping that heritage?
You OBL-ers do your DAMNDEST to avoid the stinking Elephant carcass in the room that is ILLEGAL INFILTRATION!
You euphemize, and pander, and race-bait your way around it, but you always end up at the point of legalizing Illegal behaviour, and REWARDING it!
THAT is an Amnesty...and you know it. And as you point out...
My main point is that the option of deporting 10 million people is not an option
...so what makes you think that they will leave WILLINGLY under McStain/Kennedy or Kyl/Cornyn? The ONLY way to get rid of them is the way I posted before...make it SO uncomfortable, and do NOT allow them access to what American Citizens have access to like Free Medical Care and Edjumikashun and Welfare...and tax/confiscate their ILLEGALLY gained assets, and tax all their wire-funds back home, to a level of 100% for anyone here ILLEGALLY....they will go HOME!
Better ping FR's tiny OBL/cheap labor lobby reps. Looks like they may have another applicant for quisling membership.
This is not true and stop trying to make us believe we have to assimilate them. They are the ones who need to assimilate into our culture. They don't. Your true colors (red,green and white) are showing.
Hear, hear!!
That is so true!
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