I don’t disagree with the fact that they want a better life, certainly Mexico and many places in South America leave a lot to be desired in the way of opportunity and career growth. Also, I have seen the poverty and squalor in which many of them live. It’s not much different than the poverty and squalor many of our immigrant relatives lived in before they came to the US. The difference is that, for most of us, our relatives emigrated here legally. America is an immigrant nation whose past is filled with the contributions of immigrants from every walk of life. To say that we don’t want or need immigration is absurd at its core. But, what most of us desire is that the immigrants come here legally. I for one think Americans should be honored anytime someone abandons their home country to relocate to ours; they pay us a huge compliment. But, more than anything else I can imagine, those immigrants coming to America must come here legally. When someone breaks into your house, they have committed a felony crime of breaking and entering. America is our home, and these people are coming in uninvited. Living in poverty simply doesn’t justify the wholesale violation that is occurring on a massive scale.
I think it's a big stretch to lump illegal immigrants in with thieves, murders and rapists.
I don’t. Thieves, murderers and rapists are as much criminals as illegal immigrants. In fact, violating our national sovereignty, for many, is only the beginning of their crime spree. Many have gone on to become thieves, rapists and murderers as well as drug runners and minor thugs. We can adequately grow our own supply of those types of folks, we don’t need them coming from outside of America to set up shop here. Granted, the vast majority are not thieves, rapists and murderers, they are just in my house without my permission. The fundamental criminal offense still exists. However, even for the vast majority of illegals, the crime spree doesn’t stop there. They must acquire documents that allow them to work. Social Security cards and/or drivers licenses are either stolen directly by the illegal, or they are purchased from someone else who stole them, or they are purchased from someone who forged them. So, the very people who just came here to make a better life for themselves and/or their families, are now supporting and supplementing additional criminal enterprises.
Illegals cause problems but also create opportunities.
Yes, they do. They create opportunities for “coyotes”, document forgers, sex slave traders, exploiters, bilingual teachers, bilingual doctors and nurses, drug kingpins, etc. That’s probably not what you meant, but it is a fact of life for the majority. They live in the shadows and are afraid to complain to the police for fear that they will be arrested and deported (how is coming here better for them?). Also, they come here demanding that we accommodate them. Many make little or no effort to learn our language or our customs and try to assimilate. Instead, they take space in our schools and demand bilingual education because they are too lazy to learn our language. They have burdened public health facilities to the extent that many clinics and taxpayer supported hospitals have had to close due to being driven bankrupt by illegals. Even Mexican health facilities on the border will send uninsured patients across the border to the US for treatment so that they don’t have to absorb those costs. Despite the whining stories of the MSM, not all illegals come here to tend lawns, wash dishes, bus tables or perform other functions that “Americans” won’t do. That’s totally untrue. After the Swift raid, how many people showed up to apply for their jobs? If I recall correctly, it was something like 3,000 Americans who showed up to apply for those jobs that Americans won’t do. And, in increasing numbers today, many of those sneaking across the border are bookkeepers, accountants, teachers and pharmacists. I haven’t heard of any Americans unwilling to do those jobs.
Rudy Giuliani is for abortion, but I'd be shocked if he would mention the word even once as President.
I would, too. But the crux of the issue isn’t necessarily about his direct, hands-on association with abortion, it’s about his ability to affect it indirectly, as well as other critical issues, that raise the concern about his public/private position. Because, whomever is elected in ’08 will get to make more SCOTUS appointments and, therein, is where many of these issues reside. Giuliani, as president, wouldn’t have to directly address the issue of Roe v. Wade, he could leave his mark via whatever SCOTUS appointments he might be able to make and get approved through the Senate. This is why the personal preferences of the president matter a great deal. President Bush didn’t directly tackle abortion, but his two SCOTUS nominees will do that for him, should the issue come before the court again. Clinton didn’t have to acknowledge that he was a raving fan of socialism and judicial activism, he let his judicial nominees do that on his behalf. Looking at the many screwy rulings coming off of the bench, it doesn’t take a great deal of effort to track the judge down and discover that the president who nominated the judge was just as screwy as the judge is. So, it doesn’t take a direct association, just a means to affect things for decades to come such as through a court appointment.
I agree that my message was a hodgepodge of issues, because I was responding to a hodgepodge of issues, and you are quite right to reply to only those that interest you.
I really love the idealism of the Statue of Liberty, which is effectively an invitation. "Bring us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to be free". I think of that as a great and grand value, perhaps America's greatest gift to the world.
So when you say illegals are not invited, you're replacing the noble words on the Statue of Liberty with a fence and an iron door slammed in people's faces. I prefer the older, more hospitable conception of America.
Besides, we have issued them another kind of invitation. We are hiring them to do work, and we're paying them, and that's effectively an invitation. You know that if we did not do this, they would not come.
I have a hard time really thinking of a country as "my home" to which I should restrict entry to people. After all, it's the home of many people I would not want to invite, if given the chance to not invite them. Would I rather have an illegal here or Al Sharpton, for example? Would I rather have an illegal here than a worker I regularly deal with, a native-born American citizen, whose fondest desire is to sleep all day?
And perhaps above all, I really hate the language many of the anti-illegal people use. "Invaders" "Cockroaches", etc, etc are only some of the names I've seen. And yet when I look at them, I just see poor people trying to make a living as best they can. It's really hard for me to feel negatively about that kind of spirit, particularly when many native born Americans, as you have noted, seem to be lazier and less enthusiastic about doing great things than ever
Perhaps I feel that the illegals live up the American spirit better than many of us do, and that makes me sad that so many of us yearn to push them out. To me, it just doesn't feel like the good thing to do.
D
Mayor Rudy Giuliani on the campaign trail
The Hugh Hewitt Show
2-23-07 at 6:11 PM
http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/Transcript_Page.aspx?ContentGuid=946ea11b-064a-4272-90d2-1e2eda6678f4
(snip)
HH: Did you have a litmus test for those hundred?
RG: No. No, not a litmus test on a single issue, a philosophical test, meaning what I wanted to know was what’s their view of how you interpret the Constitution and laws? Are they…do the Constitution and laws exist as the thing from which you have to discern the meaning and the intent? Or are you going to superimpose your own social views? And I want, I like the first kind of judge, who is a judge who looks to the meaning of the Constitution, doesn’t try to create it.
HH: A pro-life voter looking at you, knowing that you’re pro-choice, but not concerned that presidents really matter so much in that, except as far as judges are concerned, what do you tell them about who you’re going to be putting on the federal bench?
RG: I’m going to say I’d put people like…I mean, the best way to do it is to just say I would, I could just have easily have appointed Sam Alito or Chief Justice Roberts as President Bush did, in fact. I’d have been pretty proud of myself if I had been smart enough to make that choice if I were the president.
HH: Do you expect justices like Roberts and Alito to come out of a Giuliani administration?
RG: I hope. I mean, that would be my goal. I mean, they’re sort of a very high standard, and so is Justices Scalia and Thomas. That would be the kind of judges I would look for, both in terms of their background and their integrity, but also the intellectual honesty with which they interpret the law.
(snip)