Brokaw On Immigration: Neither Wall, Nor US Teens At $16/HR, Will Work

Today Show/NewsBusters ^ | Mark Finkelstein

[governsleastgovernsbest]

Appearing on this Boxing Day edition of the Today show to plug tonight's airing of "In the Shadow of the American Dream," the latest in the “Tom Brokaw Reports” series, the former Nightly News anchor offered a variety of views on the subject of illegal immigration straight out of the amnesty-crowd playbook.

View video here.

Annotated excerpts:

• "It's not going to work to send everybody back."

Why not? And if sending illegals home isn't the solution, how about drying up the jobs here so they will have their own motivation to return home?

• "I don't think you can build the highest wall in the world and it will stop them from coming."

Really? How much would it cost to build, say, a high-tech, 20-foot tall/20-foot deep fence along the border, and how much of the illegal immigration would it stop? I'm guessing a lot.

• "They're filling jobs that Americans don't want to fill anymore."

Ah, the classic formulation. But says who, and at what wages?

• "You can't get high school kids to earn $14-16 to dig ditches and carry bricks and do the hard work. They don't want to do it. They'd rather be at their computer or work in fast food stores."

Really? High school kids won't work for $16/hour and would rather flip burgers for half that? Data please, Tom.

• "The other part of it is, we can't do this alone. Mexico has to play a big part of this. And Mexico is not much interested because these illegal immigrants across America are sending back an estimated $8 billion a year. So it's going to take, I think, the good efforts of all parties to get this resolved and Mexico has to be a big piece of that."

Except you just said - and history proves - that Mexico doesn't want to solve the problem. Which makes it our problem. To quote Mark Steyn, this sounds like a job for America, alone.

Contact Mark at mark@gunhill.net

[Moonman62]

Using illegal aliens for labor is the modern day replacement for slavery.

[Renegade]

Mr. Brokaw,
A lot of American citizens who aren't supposed to want to do dirty work showed up for jobs at the Swift meat plant when they cleaned out the illegals .

[supremedoctrine]

It would be nice if the problem would fix itself if it followed your list of suggestions,but the problem is unfixable as it stands. Pursuing the most logical course that you suggest would only compound a problem that is being foisted on us in such a way that the only "solution" is the one the current Administration keeps helpfully putting off until some kind of nonexistent consensus is reached on some far-off day when a comprehensive plan is arrived at. Get it? The "PROBLEM" is NOT SUPPOSED TO BE FIXED. WE are supposed to be fixed.

[Labyrinthos]

Make it a crime to knowingly employ an illegal.

It already is a crime. The problem is that the law is rarely enforced and when it is, proving "knowingly" is extremely difficult. What they ought to do is to make it a crime to hire illegals without regard to actual knowledge, like statutory rape.

[Dilbert56]

You stay classy, Brokaw. STFU is a very classy move.

[raybbr]

How come so few people seem to understand this little fact?

Because so many Americans are physically as well as intellectually lazy.

[Menehune56]

Thank you for the link to a most informative article backed up with excellent data. I was struck by its conclusion:

''Current legislative proposals that would grant amnesty to illegal immigrants and increase future low-skill immigration would represent the largest expansion of the welfare state in 30 years.

Obviously what the liberal left, aided and abetted by the corporate right, are intending!

[jiggyboy]

"I don't think you can build the highest wall in the world and it will stop them from coming."

Willful ignorance of Israel's wall keeping the parasites out. The Berlin Wall, which he possibly might have heard of, did pretty well too.

He'd probably play word games on being challenged, though. "No, I meant 100% effective..."

[ClaireSolt]

If you really listened to these dems you woulod think we could dissolve the government entirely. They argue that law enforcement is a wasted effort. Likewise they never expect results from their social programs and don't even measure them. Anarchy anyone?

[x_plus_one]

Brokaw is a cloistered liberal. He lives in the east coast echo chamber of socialist blather. The MSM is a prolonged anxiety attack.

[governsleastgovernsbest]

"Willful ignorance of Israel's wall."

Excellent counter-evidence.

[ckilmer]

The press secretary for the California Republican Party is the son of illegal aliens who came the USA 35 years ago. In this article he chronicles how in recent years there has been a massive change in the number and kind of illegals coming north. Including a crimnal element that is causing a deterioration in the quality of life of Americans. Consider this article Illegal aliens murder 12 Americans daily Death toll in 2006 far overshadows total U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq, Afghanistan

People have been referring to the Captains Quarters as a rebuke to the assertions of the article. The Captain's Quarters make the assertion that for the numbers to be true it would have to be the case that a small number of people were committing a lot of crimes. That is to say far outside the statistical norm for the USA. The problem is that he didn't actually check the federal stats. As it happens it is the case that illegals tend to be very repeat offenders. 3

Below are some government stats to back up the article's assertioms

From the FBI crime statistics * An estimated 16,692 persons were murdered nationwide in 2005, an increase of 3.4 percent from the 2004 figure. * Murder comprised 1.2 percent of the overall estimated number of violent crimes in 2005. (Based on Table 1.) * There were an estimated 5.6 murders per 100,000 inhabitants.

Illegal Alien Crime Wave

On April 7, 2005, the US Justice Department issued a report on criminal aliens that were incarcerated in federal and state prisons and local jails. In the population study of 55,322 illegal aliens, researchers found that they were arrested at least a total of 459,614 times, averaging about 8 arrests per illegal alien. Nearly all had more than 1 arrest. Thirty-eight percent (about 21,000) had between 2 and 5 arrests, 32 percent (about 18,000) had between 6 and 10 arrests, and 26 percent (about 15,000) had 11 or more arrests. Most of the arrests occurred after 1990. They were arrested for a total of about 700,000 criminal offenses, averaging about 13 offenses per illegal alien. One arrest incident may include multiple offenses, a fact that explains why there are nearly one and half times more offenses than arrests. Almost all of these illegal aliens were arrested for more than 1 offense. Slightly more than half of the 55,322 illegal aliens had between 2 and 10 offenses.

CRIMINAL HISTORY

More than two-thirds of the defendants charged with an immigration offense were identified as having been previously arrested. Thirty-six percent had been arrested on at least 5 prior occasions; 22%, 2 to 4 times; and 12%,1 time. Sixty-one percent of those defendants had been convicted at least once; 18%, 5 or more times; 26%, 2 to 4 times; and 17%, 1 time. Of those charged, 49% had previously been convicted of a felony: 20% of a drug offense; 18%, a violent offense; and 11%, other felony offenses. Twelve percent had previously been convicted of a misdemeanor. Defendants charged with unlawful reentry had the most extensive criminal histories. Nine in ten had been previously arrested. Of those with a prior arrest, half had been arrested on at least 5 prior occasions. Fifty-six percent of those charged with a reentry offense had previously been convicted of a violent or drug-related felony. By contrast, under half of those charged with alien smuggling, a third of those charged with unlawful entry, and just over a quarter those charged with misuse of visas and other charges had previously been arrested. The criminal histories of these defendants were generally less extensive: more than 70% had been previously arrested fewer than 5 times. Sources: US Department of Homeland Security, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, National Security Institute, National Association of Chiefs of Police, US Department of Justice

[nothingnew]

They still dig ditches by hand? Who knew? Maybe I ought to build a ditch-digging machine and solve the illegal problem and become a millionaire to boot. I'll call it...the backhoe.

FMCDH(BITS)

[gubamyster]

ping

[moehoward]

Correct. Expect MUCH more sob and 'no matter what we do, it wont stop' stories,

[Chuck Dent]

We are never going to send them all back, nor are we going to amend the 14th. Given those facts, what does the US get out of illegal immigration other than a lot of low-skilled, high social cost illegals?

It's high time this country begins dealing with fair compensation, which in this case is annexation of Mexico. If 50% or so of their citizens are going to live here, then, by definition, don't they have a claim on their own country?

A Mexico operating under US legal jurisdiction would literally explode from foreign/US investment. Baja alone could possibly see the entire world's investment capital devoted to bringing 1,000 miles of prime Pacific oceanfront property up to par with the 1,000 miles above it (from SD to Seattle).

Time is running out, but not for the US. There's nothing wrong with Mexico other than its government.

[dalereed]

"High school kids never did this for full time work anyway."

I started doing construction work when I was 14, am a college graduate, and ran the construction business for 22 years that my father started and had to shut down because I couldnt compete whith criminal competition hiring illegals.

I'm still doing construction work today 55 years later but with a standard of living that is 1/3 of what it was 15 years ago.

[taxed2death]

....another clueless talking head. Recent immigration raids prove otherwise. Americans applied for and obtained the jobs that "Americans weren't willing to do"

LOL

[Bernard]

I agree with Mr. Brokaw that we should not spend the money to build a wall. We should punish employers who provide jobs to these people, knowing that they are breaking the law by doing so.

We should punish rich people who hire illegal aliens as housekeepers, nannies, and gardeners kwnoing that they are breaking the law by doing so.

There is no need to build a wall. There is a need to convince Americans to obey the laws governing the employment of illegals. Those who choose not to obey should face heavy penalties for their choice.

Most everything else Mr. Brokaw says is garbage.

[brytlea]

And add to that the contingent who reap shortsighted benefits, and I suppose there you have it.
suise