Myth vs. Fact: (You cannot deport 12 million people) Oh Yes You Can!

The New American ^ | May 1, 2006 | Thomas R. Eddlem

[underwiredsupport]

 

Myth vs. Fact
by Thomas R. Eddlem
May 1, 2006

http://www.thenewamerican.com/artman/publish/printer_3745.shtml

Politicians and pundits are defending illegal immigration with worn-out myths that can easily be proven wrong.

Myth: Illegal immigrants contribute greatly to the American economy.

Fact: So-called statistics supporting this myth are typically a deceptive amalgam of statistics and supposition arranged to conceal an undeniable truth. Consider, for instance, this statement from the ACLU paper Immigrants and the Economy (2002): "Immigrants pay more than $90 billion in taxes every year and receive only $5 billion in welfare. Without their contributions to the public treasury, the economy would suffer enormous losses." If 32.5 million immigrants (the total of legal and illegal immigrants, according to the recent U.S. Census figures) really pay $90 billion in taxes, then they pay half the taxes the average native-born American pays. Note too that the ACLU combines both legal and illegal immigrants into its statistic. Most taxes paid by immigrants are paid by legal immigrants. Illegal immigrants often pay little or no taxes because many of them are working "under the table" in the underground, cash-based economy.

Welfare is a term limited to only a few federal subsidy programs, and the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) notes: "Even though illegal aliens make little use of welfare, from which they are generally barred, the costs of illegal immigration in terms of government expenditures for education, criminal justice, and emergency medical care are significant." CIS estimates that the total net cost of illegal immigration is an annual drain on the government of $11-22 billion annually.

Myth: We are a nation of immigrants.

Fact: This myth is false on its face. Nearly 88 percent of the people living in the United States today are not immigrants; they were born here. This is a nation of natives, not a nation of immigrants. "But," the liberal propagandists reply, "we all have ancestors who come from other countries." And, one might reply, so does just about every other nation on Earth.

Are not the French merely descendents of the immigrant barbarian Franks, who drove out the Roman era Celtic Gauls? And the English are simply immigrant Angles and Saxons who virtually wiped out the Celtic Britons in the fifth century A.D. They too are simply nations of immigrants under this liberal myth, as is practically every other nation on Earth. The myth descends to meaninglessness upon any serious analysis. Yet whenever this myth is uttered, we are expected to nod our heads in agreement that a deep and salient point has been made.

Myth: You cannot deport 12 million people.

Fact: This is nothing more than a slogan for people who have stopped trying to address the problem. The U.S. government needs to begin deporting illegal aliens, and even if it only deports a fraction of them over the next few years that would be progress. If the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency deported only two million of the 12 million illegal aliens, 10 million illegals would be better than 12 million.

Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) notes that enforcing employer sanctions could lead many to go home on their own without deportation proceedings: "If you can't get a job in this country, and if you can't get social service benefits, you go home." Additionally, a lot of immigrants visit families on their own, and wouldn't be able to get back in if Congress decides to secure the border.

On the other hand, if the 12 million illegals are legalized, none would be deported. Moreover, this amnesty (whether called amnesty or not) would simply induce more illegals to cross the Rio Grande in the hopes of waiting until the next amnesty.

Myth: Illegal immigrants are only taking jobs Americans do not want.

Fact: Many illegal immigrants are able to work for less than market value because they don't pay income or Social Security taxes and are able to take their entire paycheck (or cash) home. This is not only unfair competition against employers who follow the law and pay employees "above the table," but it depresses the wage scale for Americans who would otherwise select jobs currently filled by illegal immigrants. These are jobs that Americans "do not want" only because the illegal immigrants have depressed the wage scale for the positions. Take away the illegal immigrants, and the market would raise wages to the level where Americans would take the jobs.

Myth: Guest workers would only be here temporarily.

Fact: History demonstrates that "guest workers" would be as temporary as the "temporary" telephone tax, still in effect, that Congress enacted in 1898 to pay for the Spanish-American War. And what would happen if 12 million "guest workers" decided not to leave? Those who argue against deporting the current 12 million illegal aliens as impractical are likely, if challenged, to say they find the prospect of deporting "guest workers" impractical as well.

Thus, it is hardly surprising that President Bush fails to mention a time limit on the "temporary" worker visas the federal government would permit under the "guest worker" program he is pushing in his public addresses. Most pending congressional legislation would limit the "guest worker" to three years — but what then?

Myth: Illegal immigrants have a right to come here. It is our Christian duty to provide hospitality.

Fact: Nearly two-thirds of the 32.5 million foreign-born people living in the United States entered this country legally, and the United States has more legal immigrants than any other country in the world. That's hardly poor hospitality, and no bill before Congress that has a chance of becoming law would change this nation's hospitality. But it is poor hospitality to say to the nearly 22 million legal U.S. immigrants who waited in line that they wasted their time following the rules because illegal immigrants will now get the same status.

The need to deport illegal aliens and secure our borders has nothing to do with persecuting minorities or lack of hospitality. The United States can continue to allow a large or small number of immigrants into this country legally, depending upon how many can be reasonably assimilated without destroying our American identity. Rather, securing our borders is necessary as a matter of principle — in the interests of equal justice under law — as well as practical security in this age of international terrorism. And this nation can no longer afford to allow "myth-information" slogans to sidetrack the nation from fulfilling the mandate of controlling the borders.
 

[Centurion2000]

bump 4 later

[Dixie Yooper]

This might work!

Take down all the signs in Spanish
Shut down all the Spanish TV and radio stations
Ticket any pickup truck drivers with riders in back
Encourage them to play the lottery, if they win and show up to collect, send them home at their own expense.

[VOATNOW1]

California should have a huge budget surplus according to the ACLU. Not to mention hospitals and public schools.

[Myrddin]

Myth: Illegal immigrants have a right to come here. It is our Christian duty to provide hospitality.

Our government has a Christian duty? I thought the establishment clause of the First Amendment prohibited the government from establishing (or practicing) an official religion. The leftists are such hypocrites. They want it both ways. Whatever suits the moment.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Let me inject reality into this issue.

The first Baby Boomers are turning 60 this year, the living members of the 77 million Americans part of that generation are starting to retire.

We have aborted roughly 40 million Americans since 1970, we continue to do so at a rate of 1.5 million per year.

Here's a snippet from one of a group of studies conducted by the Population Reference Bureau titled Reports on America, published in May 2002; this particular segment called "Government Spending" touching on the upcoming problems faced by the Social Security Administration:

"Lee and Miller estimate that the country would need to admit an additional 5 million immigrants per year, quintupling the current level of immigration, in order to achieve long-term balance in the Social Security trust fund. A recent report from the United Nations Population Division reached a similar conclusion for European countries, announcing that even much larger migration flows than are currently permitted would not counterbalance the effects of population aging.

To maintain the 2000 ratio between the working-age population (people between the ages of 20 and 64) and the older population (people ages 65 and older), the United States would need roughly 95 million more working-age persons in 2025, in addition to those already expected at current levels of immigration. In other words, if the entire working-age population of Mexico were to move to the United States in 2025, there still would not be enough people to restore the old-age dependency ratio of 2000. -- Source

So, we have the oncoming juggernaut of the Baby Boomer retirements, coupled with the ongoing and government protected genocide of the unborn in the name of "choice" creating a deficiency in the working age population's ability to maintain the Ponzi scheme known as Social Security afloat making it imperative for the US to repopulate itself from outside sources.

What we do know is that the American people will not tolerate an immigration policy that calls for immigration in the numbers cited by Lee's study, so what does the Federal government do instead?

They let just about the rigt number of people enter the country illegally, grant them amnesty, and let the cycle begin all over again.

The extra added bonus of course can be found in what the Social Security Administration calls the Earnings Suspense File.

For those of you who do not like that source, try this one.

Why do we have millions of illegal aliens in this country?

Look at this graph:

Starting in the late 1980's, the Social Security Administration received a flood of W-2 earnings reports with incorrect - sometimes simply fictitious - Social Security numbers. It stashed them in what it calls the "earnings suspense file" in the hope that someday it would figure out whom they belonged to.

The file has been mushrooming ever since: $189 billion worth of wages ended up recorded in the suspense file over the 1990's, two and a half times the amount of the 1980's.

In the current decade, the file is growing, on average, by more than $50 billion a year, generating $6 billion to $7 billion in Social Security tax revenue and about $1.5 billion in Medicare taxes.

In 2002 alone, the last year with figures released by the Social Security Administration, nine million W-2's with incorrect Social Security numbers landed in the suspense file, accounting for $56 billion in earnings, or about 1.5 percent of total reported wages.

Follow the money.

[Luis Gonzalez]

In other words, violate the First Amendment.

Another brilliant scheme.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Even you must recognize the most simple of all accounting principles..there are two entries on a ledger.

They don't just "cost", they generate as well.

[Myrddin]

That JUST Social Security taxes mind you, they also pay sales taxes.

Big deal. I pay taxes on my purchases when I visit other countries LEGALLY with my passport stamped for a visit. That doesn't confer any rights of citizenship in the countries I'm visiting. Paying taxes as an illegal invader doesn't entitle you to rights of citizenship either. There is a correct way to immigrate and become a citizen. The laws are already on the books. It's time to enforce them.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Dan...why did they go home after working when the Bracero program was in place?

[houeto]

Dane told me this very day that he was FOR securing the border, just not with "neoBerlinesque walls and land mines and sharpshooters". I asked him by what means he would use to EFFECTIVELY secure the border.

Guess what.

*crickets chirping*

[Luis Gonzalez]

"Paying taxes as an illegal invader doesn't entitle you to rights of citizenship either."

Since I never said anything of the sort, I must assume that you meant to say that to someone else.

[Dixie Yooper]

If applied to a citizen, it is a violation.

[Luis Gonzalez]

It's a violation if applied to anyone.

P.S. Spanish language media is owned by citizens.

[calex59]

The trick is to start deporting and securing the border at the same time, eventually we would have it down to a trickle coming in(you are always going to have some sneak in, somehow, it is a given)and a flood going out. No reason we can't do both at the same time. Secure and deport, start now!

[Myrddin]

Usually, they're on the payroll--using someone else's Social Security number.

Just stealing identities that legal American citizens don't have to steal. More felonious behavior. Identity theft. Use of false documents to obtain employment. Working without a green card and work visa. Employment of an illegal alien. So many felonies, so little effort to prosecute.

[William Terrell]

Ahhh, I love chili. But I don't love illegal aliens.

[antiRepublicrat]

When I first joined the Border Patrol my Sector made over 200,000 apprehensions.

After the officers did a fine job in the apprehension, how many of those were catch and release?

[Valpal1]

Unfortunately, that's only SS taxes they pay, not income since they usually fill out w-2's with the maximum deductions. And this doesn't include any illegals working for cash.

I have no problem with bumping the legal immigration numbers up. But I want the illegals to be sent home or go home voluntarily to be processed back accross the border as legal immigrants.

[KeyLargo]

Apathy high atop Mexican presidential ballot
Low turnout a concern in July 2 election

MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AP) -- A joke is spreading around the Mexican capital as the campaigns gear up for the nation's July presidential elections: "If the three main candidates were together in a plane crash, who would survive?"

The answer: "Mexico!"

The wisecrack about conservative Felipe Calderon, leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, and Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which long held nearly absolute power in Mexico, illustrates the feelings of many Mexicans toward the first presidential race since the nation restored multiparty democracy in 2000.

And as the candidates have their first televised debate Tuesday, a numbing mixture of apathy and contempt for politicians has infected many voters, raising concerns of absenteeism and its consequences.

"There are no good candidates," said Rafael Cruz, 79, a retired leather worker from Mexico City, who complains his eldest son was laid off last year and can't find a new job. "Do you think that one of these clowns is going to solve all the problems we have in Mexico?"

During seven decades of PRI rule, winning candidates were pre-selected by party...........
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/04/24/mexico.vote.ap/index.html?section=cnn_latest

I heard that G.W. will be on the ballot!

[TheLion]

Ping!