Posted on 05/23/2006 8:25:20 AM PDT by Gordongekko909
The immigration bill before Congress has some of the most serious consequences for the future of this country. Yet it is not being discussed seriously by most politicians or most of the media. Instead, it is being discussed in a series of glib talking points that insult our intelligence.
Some of the most momentous consequences -- a major increase in the number of immigrants admitted legally -- are not even being discussed at all by those who wrote the Senate bill, though Senator Jeff Sessions has uncovered those provisions in the bill and brought them out into the light of day.
How many times have we heard that illegal aliens are taking "jobs that Americans won't do"? Just what specifically are those jobs?
Even in occupations where illegals are concentrated, such as agriculture, cleaning, construction, and food preparation, the great majority of the work is still being done by people who are not illegal aliens.
The highest concentration of illegals is in agriculture, where they are 24 percent of the people employed. That means three-quarters of the people are not illegal aliens. But when will the glib phrase-mongers stop telling us that the illegals are simply taking "jobs that Americans won't do"?
Another insult to our intelligence is that amnesty is not amnesty if you call it something else. The fact that illegals will have to fulfill certain requirements to become American citizens is supposed to mean that this is not amnesty.
But let's do what the spinmeisters hope we will never do -- stop and think. Amnesty is overlooking ("forgetting," as in amnesia) the violation of the law committed by those who have crossed our borders illegally.
The fact that there are requirements for getting American citizenship is a separate issue entirely. Illegal aliens who do not choose to seek American citizenship are under no more jeopardy than before. They have de facto amnesty.
Yet another insult to our intelligence is saying that, since we cannot find and deport 12 million people, the only choice left is to find some way to make them legal.
There is probably no category of law-breakers -- from counterfeiters to burglars or from jay-walkers to murderers -- who can all be found and arrested. But no one suggests that we must therefore make what they have done legal.
Such an argument would suggest that there is nothing in between 100 percent effective law enforcement and zero percent effective law enforcement.
The reverse twist on this argument is that suddenly taking 12 million people out of the labor force would disrupt the economy. No one has ever said -- or probably even dreamed -- that we could suddenly find all 12 million illegal immigrants at once and send them all home immediately. This is another straw man argument.
The real question is what we do with whatever illegal aliens we do find. Right now, there are various communities around the country where local officials have a policy of forbidding the police from reporting illegal immigrants to federal authorities.
Why are people who are so gung ho for punishing employers so utterly silent about needing to punish government officials who openly and deliberately violate federal laws?
Employers, after all, are not in the business of law enforcement.
If some guy who runs a hardware store or a dry cleaning business hires someone who shows some forged documents, why should the employer be fined for not being able to tell the difference, when government officials who can tell the difference are not doing anything -- or are even actively obstructing federal laws?
Putting unarmed national guardsmen on the border is another cosmetic move, a placebo instead of real medicine. The excuse is that it is not possible to train more than 1,500 border patrol agents a year. Meanwhile, we have trained well over 200,000 Iraqi security forces while guerilla warfare raged around them.
You can put a million people on the border and it will mean nothing if those who are caught are simply turned loose and sent back to try again tomorrow -- or perhaps later the same day.
By the way, I just picked up a copy of A Conflict of Visions about half an hour ago. I think I saw it referenced somewhere in this thread... I might post a review or something when I finish reading it.
I would have to agree that MNJ does take himself a little too series. His approach and attitude seems to contradict the point(s) he's trying to make. I just got FReepmail from him saying he's done here. I don't know why I was included on his distribution list, since I've never FReeped him. C'est la vie.
Thanks for the ping, good article and some real fireworks on the thread. :-)
By sweepers, I assume you mean street sweepers. They have machines that do that now. I suspect those were make work positions during the depression anyway.
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A little historical note: Almost 200 years ago street sweeping was done by contract granted by the city officials to private citizens. My Irish immigrant ancestor actually won several of these contracts, and I guess did an acceptable job because he died a property owner.
Street sweeping in the 1820s was to clear the streets of what the transport mode of the day left behind on the roads - not a job that "Americans" of that day would choose to do, I guess.
He also worked on digging the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal. His father-in-law had a business of rendering fat for candles, etc. None of these jobs was in any way desirable, but they looked okay to some folk who thought that anything in America was better than what they could experience in their home country, Ireland.
Sowell is awesome. No question.
If he is troubled, I'll toss him a prayer. I just got tired of the name calling, especially at some of the brightest FReepers around.
I enjoyed reading your homepage.
regards,
sjb.
..once again, Dr. Sowell has it nailed...
I am steamed that we have a massive plan to stop and check all drivers for seatbelts this weekend, but we cannot deport 12 million. Give me a break. Forget the seatbelts and snag the illegals, instead.
Consider this from the employer's viewpoint. Suppose there is an American willing to fill every job. If your assumption is correct, it is to the employer's economic advantage to hire the illegal instead of the "willing American."
You mean because they wield god-like powers, don't you?
That strikes a blow to the sovereignty of the people, and our ability to clean house on election day.
You bet it does... but one of these days either the American citizenry will need to physically throw our rulers out of office and "decorrupt" the system, or it will reach the entropic point where there is no return possible and America will simply cease to be.
Man it's a depressing thought that the people would be as apathetic as to just _let_ it happen...
They would still add to the supply of labor, thus exerting a downward pressure on wages. It would just be unable to go below the minimum.
Very funny!! Maybe we should have an invasion of our own. Conquista Mexico!!
Is that really how we should treat one another?
If you think MM is over the line tell him in private not here and how you feel with his outburst!
I think we need go beyond our self when someone else is in pain, it might not even be FR it could be an intenral battle...
So instead like so much of mankind we get puff up!
This is a monment to reach out an either pray for another or be kind in some way!
We have a choice we don't have return in kind!
If the latter, who will the employers hire then?
Unfortunately, I doubt the ACLU would see it the same way.
I bet they're salivating thinking about all the lawsuits they'll be bringing...
I did not tell him anything. Re-read #142. I was not in the middle of the wrangling between two other FReepers.
BTW, what is "puff Up?
It was you wasn't it that refered to him on this thread and said...
"C'est la vie."
***
BTW, what is "puff Up?
sorry a failing of mine!
puffed Up?
Yeah, totally. It's a war zone in here.
Also it use to be if someone freeped you that was to remain private unless a person wanted to embrass or shame another!
Some how freepmail is not private anymore!
The funny thing is sometimes I would free someone instead of posting on the thread as not to embrass them, and they would post it on the thread thinking to embrasse me, when if what I said to them, was said to me, I would be glad the person told me in freemail instead of the theard.
But some here are very dense
ping for later.
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