Posted on 02/02/2006 1:50:05 PM PST by FerdieMurphy
Two years ago, Border Patrol agents began to voice what many believed were legitimate concerns about "armed incursions" into the United States from Mexico-based assailants. Now these invasions occur routinely putting federal agents' and law enforcement officers' lives in jeopardy.
They reported that heavily armed Mexican army units and federal police, called federales, had infiltrated US territory and fired upon them, in some cases because –- federal agents would later discover –- Mexican drug lords had put prices on the heads of American law-enforcement agents strung out along the border. Where was the outrage by our political leaders and the mainstream media over this blatant violation of our national sovereignty?
Many of our political leaders and most in the news media ignore these violent attacks on our national sovereignty while more and more Americans are saying, "This has got to stop!"
While tens of millions of Americans watched and listened to President George Bush's much anticipated State of the Union speech, many were disappointed at the lack of emphasis on the biggest threat to national security today: unmitigated illegal immigration and porous US borders.
President Bush continues to maintain a contradictory and perilous position regarding illegal immigration, claiming his plan does not amount to amnesty. Standard American language usage contravenes the President’s specious explanation in that his plan clearly overlooks the offense of illegal aliens who entered this country in violation of law and would not seek prosecution; a full amnesty within contextual and explicit meaning.
The current position of the Administration on illegal immigration is demonstrative of a flawed public and enforcement policy which undermines national security by encouraging future mass illegal immigration. Additionally, the intention of the President sends contradictory signals to agencies tasked with securing our borders as well as police commanders across the nation.
In a recent Washington Times article in which the President attempted to justify his position on illegal immigration, the President stated the current immigration situation is a “bureaucratic nightmare” and the Border Patrol is “overstressed” due to “people [illegal immigrants] streaming across [the border].”
Further evidence of the Administration’s contradictory position on illegal immigration are statements made by political appointees charged with protecting the public. In September of 2004, in an effort to build support for the Administration’s Amnesty proposal, Asa Hutchinson, former Homeland Security Undersecretary, publicly stated it is “not realistic” to arrest or deport illegal aliens already in the country.
More recently, budget problems within the Department of Homeland Security further called into question the priorities of the Administration as agents are forced to release illegal aliens and curtail operations due to ongoing financial constraints. These circumstances all contribute to a “bureaucratic nightmare” and “overstressed” Border Patrol.
The position of the Administration on illegal immigration has had a profound and negative effect not only on law enforcement operations, but also border patrol agent morale. The impact on agent morale was measured in a survey conducted by independent Hart Research Associates during the summer of 2004.
The survey found a majority of agents were demoralized and were not getting the full support needed to protect the country, clearly indicating a conflict between the view of professional field agents and the Administration in regard to national domestic security. The Administration’s current immigration plans will exacerbate, not alleviate, that problem.
For those tuning in to hear President Bush address the problems faced as a result of rampant illegal immigration and Mexican military incursions, the speech was a major disappointment.
We don't need these invaders, we need to get our country back to some pride inits youth. Get the young ones away from the playstation and to a job.
Who cleaned toilets and cleaned dishes before these people came? Who cut the lawns?
We got along just fine without almost ten percent of the population being illegal aliens.
Oh where to begin????
Are you so drunk on Bush punch to believe that these people will ever be forced to leave? Do you think that they will not bring their dependents right away and no one will stop them?
Wrong. These companies depend on illegals to turn a profit by not paying payroll taxes and worker's comp payroll premiums.
Cry me a river for these poor poor employers who can't make it in business but for illegal labor practices and screwing other business people trying to act in accordance with the law.
Another reason you are dead wrong is that the cost to businesses will go upif a plan like this exists because the employers will have to pay taxes on the illegals thus driving uptheir costs. At that time, these businesses will demand cheaper labor from newer illegals who subvert the guest worker plan.
Without strong enforcement of existing laws, everyone knows that any new law will be a joke just like every previous one.
"There's a reason why we're not being swamped with illegals from Bangladesh."
Walk around Queens NY for about a day and you will change your mind about that statement.
If that's the only major location in the country where there's any serious concentration of Bangladeshi illegals then I think we're doing OK in that department, comparatively speaking.
That's exactly where you're wrong. Too many important industries could not stand the disruption in business caused by having to get rid of long term, reliable workers in hopes of someday getting guest workers that have been through a gov't process (and if you think that could be quick, you are .....)
Agriculture, food processing, construction, hospitality, nursing home, & child care are just a few of the industries that would be hard hit. And those are all important to our economy.
We have very few Congressfolk who don't have one of those industries who will lobby hard to keep current workers.
Sure, in 60 years or so.
I'm not saying the authorities should have to come down on these companies like a ton of bricks all at once.
I am. I'm saying that our program should be that if employers can't prove that all of their employees are legal, or have sponsored guest application status within a reasonable time frame, like 6 months or even a year, they should be heavily fined or prosecuted. That's the only way we'll end the problem.
So you claim. A simple way to test it is to pass the legislation and see what happens. It won't make anything worse, and if things turn out as glacial as you predict, then you'd have some ammunition to use to push your plan. And the groundwork would already be laid for it.
There can only be one logical reason for being so adamantly opposed to it as many Beltway politicians are, and that is that they're afraid it will work, not that it won't.
OK. Name one gov't program that got up and running in an expeditious manner. If you can't (and I'm sure you can't), explain why this one would be different.
How about Medicare and Medicaid? It was a huge joint program that fully went into effect the year after it was passed by Congress, and that was a much larger operation than any guest-worker program would be. And guest-worker programs have been held up for two years because of the provisions for illegals that their advocates have been absolutely insisting on. If two years ago we had passed a guest-worker program for non-illegals only, it would definitely have been up and running by now. If then we decided that it wasn't working, it would have been much easier at that point to extend the existing program to illegals, than to have to build it up completely from scracth.
So there's really no excuse to be opposed to a program that's not made available to illegals at first. It can always be extended to them later if we decide it's necessary to do so.
You got me - you seem to be saying that a program that is started is good enough, no matter whether it does what it was meant to do, is effective, or how awful the secondary effects are. Never mind corruption and runaway expenses.
Yes, Medicare and Medicaid programs started up fairly fast, and I can't imagine that anyone would have opted for either program if they knew how they would turn out.
I really should have said "expedient" not "expeditious".
No, I'm saying that I disagree with you about how effective it would be, and am willing to put it to the test. If it shows itself to be largely ineffective, we could then move on to your idea, and we'd already be three quarters of the way there. There's no valid reason for any supporter of a guest-worker program to be so adamantly opposed to this route, to the point of holding things up for years. How much has that cost us, in terms of dollars as well as opportunities for crime and corruption?
I do worry that an ineffective guest worker program (which I think your proposal is) would just convince people that guest worker programs don't work at all. And I do think we need one.
The primary goals of a guest worker program are to make sure that we know who and where immigrants are (your proposal would do nothing toward that); to make sure that they go home after their jobs are done (your proposal would only do that for some); and that they didn't bring dependents with them (your proposal wouldn't stop the ones who want to do that).
And, of course, to make sure that seasonal employers (which many of them are) have the work force that they need, without taxpayers having to foot the bill in the off-season. But why would they care whether they're hiring legals or illegals? The answer is, they don't under the current system, or under your proposal.
All that would be needed would be to combine the program with just a spike in enforcement, and that would be enough to get both employers and employees to see that their best bet is to go the legal route. Once it's jumpstarted that way, it will be much easier to maintain it, because the more people go the legal route, the easier it would be to take action against those who don't.
But if you don't agree, all that would be necessary would be to make it clear at the time the program is enacted that this is a pilot program, and that the option of extending it to illegals, if it doesn't work as fast as some would prefer, will be on the table. But holding it up out of fears that it won't be effective enough will only guarantee stagnancy.
I agree. But enforcement has to be focussed on the employers. We already know that we can't enforce the laws by focussing on the illegals. If they cared, they'd be legal.
You can't be serious. Laws don't take effect because people "care" to obey them, but because they're enforced. We haven't been enforcing our laws. We certainly haven't been making more than a laughable attempt to secure the border.
I would argue that border security alone - serious border security, that is - would go a long way towards reducing the problem. But if you want to include employers as well, then I would also argue that under a guest worker plan not available to illegals, it would be possible to tighten the vise on employers just enough to light a fire under their butts to get them to want to shift towards legal workers rather than illegal ones. And like I said, once the process is jumpstarted, it will be much easier to maintain it.
Again, we have the difference where I think that as long as we reward illegals with jobs, we can't stop them. And you seem to think that if we are "nice", they will play by our rules.
Are you a Liberal? It looks like it.
Uh, no. You might try responding to what I wrote.
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