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.
Not so sure....I haven't seen him/her making any reference to nancy pelosi or Queen Cankles yet...
Something about when he had raised more money than any candidate ever had, like 18 months before the election.
And our alternative was McCain, he of McCain-Kennedy.
We really don't get much choice about how this country is governed.
If it even looks like there's a serious chance that an amnesty bill will pass, that number will swell by millions as people rush into the country to take advantage of it. It's happened before.
It also means that we are accepting whoever happend to come here illegally without concern if they have skills or a job. It means that we the taxpayers assume the responsibility of providing for millions that are not providing for themselves.
Mexico is not a poor country. Mexico's wealth is concentrated amoung a small number of people. Instead of their country providing for their people they are exporting their problems to the US. Mexico is a soverign country. We can't just go in and demand that they provide for better economic development and give their people a better chance to earn a living. We can't and shouldn't demand that they redistribute their wealth. However, we also shouldn't just provide for their people when they break the law and come to our country.
There are a lot of hard working people in Mexico with skills we need that are willing to come here to work. Let those who want to come apply and then we should match the ones we need with a job and invite them in for our mutual benefit.
This is why we have this problem. The left half of the country doesn't think we have a problem. And the right half of the country says "what is it you don't understand about the word 'illegal'". Neither answer will ever work. Some third way is required, or we really will lose a great deal of this country to "North Mexico".
Amnesty has been tried and failed and it made matters worse. I do realize the magnitude of the problem. I also realize that the longer we wait to address it, the harder it becomes.
This is going to be hard. It's going to be painful. It's going to be fought in the courts all the way to the supreme court. Opponents will do everything they can to delay it. They will claim that it's inhumane to deport people that are here illegally. All kinds of countries that treat their own citizens horribly will make bogus claims of human rights violations.
I don't think theire's a chance of the American people having the will to follow through on it without a guest worker program to provide legal immigration options. However, if we just grant amnesty we are accepting all to problems that are already bankrupting our state and federal governments.
We've let the problem go too far to just accept the mistakes we've made and start from there.
Even if we allow those here currently to apply, we can't allow people to stay in the guest worker program that cannot support themselves. We cannot allow their families to stay here if they can't support their families. It isn't just a problem of them breaking the law, they are also bankrupting us because we haven't restriceted immigration to people who are providing a benefit to our society.
Part of any meaningful immigration refore will need to be the requirement that we actually deport those that overstay visas and deport those unable to provide for themselves.
Neither those here illegally or those here on a guest worker program should be elligible for welfare or medicaid. If they need emergency medical care that they are unable to pay for and do not have insurance to cover, we should provide it, and then deport them.
Some elements must be border enforcement. A Guest worker program. And *real* assimilation for those who stay.
Immigrants that become citizens should be assimilated into our society and treated as everyone else in our society.
Guest workers should be treated with the same respect, and treated equally by employers, but they should not be treated identically to citizens by our government.
If you are a citizen we have safety nets of welfare and medicade in case you fall on hard times. Guest workers are not citizens and should not receive such benefits. There are here as guests and if they cannot provide a benefit to our society, that invitation should be revoked.
We should provide a path to citizenship for those that excel. However we cannot take on the problems of other governments that are not providing oppertunity for their own people unless it benefits us in the process.
by narby (Hillary! The Wicked Witch of the Left)
They will NOT go home when their time is up, come'on. Does anyone really believe that anyone at all would really do that if the whole environment doesn't change?
I think there are more like 25 million illegals, btw.
I stayed registered Republican so that I can vote against Republican incumbents in the primaries and maybe for Tom Tancredo too. But I voted for the Constitution Party in the general election and am still feeling good about it.
Sad too that they cannot honesty eplain their perfidy, but instead couch it in lies about "temporary" and "guest".
1776-2006: Two hundred and thirty years. Not a bad run, but it could have been a lot longer, had we gotten better leaders toward the end than the likes of Ted Kennedy, George Bush, and Bill Clinton.
Regardless of it it's 10 million or 26 million. The problem is massive enough to bankrupt us if ignored or made legal through amnesty. It's also massive enough to make it very difficult to actually hold that many deportation hearings.
Borders & Spending (Including earmarks). Pubs added fuel to the fire.
That rate does not reflect the workers who's benefits have expired, it does not reflect the people that used to make $20 an hour with heath benefits that now make $7.50 and no benefits. That figure does not reflect those that have taken part time work because there is nothing else.
Instead let look to the words of the president. Spoken only like a man that never really had a job he said "The economy is good, the average 30 year old has had 10 jobs"
Does he really believe the average 30 yr old WANTS to have had 10 jobs? They have 10 jobs because the work disappears from under them
Ask the engineers that have seen their jobs disappear , the computer programers that now work at radio shack, the men that used to support their families with factory work .
You know Dane, sooner or later the roosters come home to roost, you may need another name so that we can hear you whine when that day comes
Ford just announced huge layoffs. But at the same time there are some "Japanese" car companies that make a higher percentage of their cars in this country than "American" companies do. So is Ford the "foreign" car company, or is Toyota the foreign car company? Since Toyota now manufactures most of it's products in the USA, I think I'll buy one of those.
The foreign manufactures do not think that Americans are too dumb or lazy as the Commerce Dept has given as a reason for companies leaving here. The actual cost difference between a Ford worker and a Foreign car maker here is about $7.00 an hour. Hardly a huge sum. Those foreign car makers get economic benefits from producing cars here as "domestic" cars AND LIGHT TRUCKS . But I am sure Congress will fix that loophole so that they will go too.
This isn't 1940. Any "real" modern war will happen so fast that if we don't have the armor in stock (and the people on duty to use it), then we just won't have it. So if it's made in England, what's the difference, except pride?
Well would you want to be "protected " by missiles that have their guidance system built by our potential enemies? Think about that for a minute.
I'm not giving anybody any money this time. Money down a rat hole. Buzzards. Frickin' vultures.
What are you talking about? Since when did legal deportation to home countries equate to transporting Jews to death camps? I may have to invke Godwin's Law on you. Exporting 10 million illegals is a big job. That is why we need to get started immediately. And one more news flash... it's been many years since there was only 10 million illegals in the US.
The "guest worker" program will NOT work out. For example, will it define what the consequences will be if a "guest worker" becomes pregnant? Will we revoke her guest worker status and send her back home to give birth?
We know the answer to that one. She'll stay here, raise her anchor baby, while another comes to take her place..repeating the cycle.
We need to revisit the 14th Amendment...sigh.
Moron.
Did you read #73. I consider this President a total waste. He has refused to protect our borders from DAY ONE. There hasn't been any recovery work by this "wonderful Republican majority" from the damages that Clinton did while he was sitting in that same chair, so what is the advantage to having a Republican majority?
We are swamped with 20+ million illegal aliens. You name the disease that we had once eradicated and we've got it back again.
Our kids aren't getting half the education they should be in the classroom because of all the time the teachers have to spend with the Hispanic and Arabic children.
The schools are teaching our kids to think being queer is something to be proud of and other deviant sex behavior, well sure try it, you might like it.
We have a National Debt that is climbing faster than a herd of Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep. All the heavy manufacturing companies have gone overseas except Caterpillar. We're closing military bases left and right, except for those the UN wants us to keep of course.
There isn't much more that the Democrats could have done that the Republicans haven't allowed to happen. Just because Bush doesn't run around on his wife you think he's great. Take your argument and stuff it.
Bingo. Of course they won't. After all, who's going to make them? George Bush? ROTFLOL!!!
The illegals are already "required" to go home right now, and no one is making them do so. How on earth is anything going to be different 3, 6, or 9 years from now, when Hispanic numbers and influence have swollen even more?
No, the "temporary" and "guest" terms are just softening labels used to market these various massive permanent-amnesty and global-labor-market schemes. No one involved with this process, including the authors of these various capitulation plans, believes these words for a second.
sheesh!
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