The immigration counterattack begins

When the American people rose up in wrath a couple of months ago and stopped dead in its tracks a bipartisan effort to ram a phony immigration "reform" bill through the Senate, I warned that our triumph was inspiring but very probably short-lived. It is extremely difficult to focus the attention of the people at large on any policy, however bad, that is wanted eagerly by an influential minority.

The policy in question -- namely, to legalize the status of the 10 or 15 million illegal aliens in this country, keep them working here for peanuts, put them on track for citizenship and open the doors to millions more (all in the name of "reform") -- has the support of not one, but two powerful minorities: professional Democratic politicians, who calculate that the great majority of them will vote Democrat if they ever become citizens, and greedy businessmen (mostly Republican), who want their cheap labor no matter what the social consequences for the country.

My fellow columnist M. Stanton Evans is responsible for the brilliant perception that the Republicans (in John Stuart Mill's formulation, transposed from Britain) are "the stupid party" and the Democrats are "the evil party." Every once in a while they get together and hatch some policy that is both stupid and evil. This is called "bipartisanship," and the immigration reform bill was a spectacular example of it.

But, as I say, our victory almost certainly won't last. Having lost the battle for the moment, the proponents of what amounts to "open borders" are already preparing to win the war a little bit at a time. We will be offered small sips from the fatal cup, at first so minor and seemingly innocent that we will be tempted to let down our guard. But gradually, over a period of years, the whole draught will be imbibed.

The first innocent little sip, in fact, is already being presented to the Senate by Sen. Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., (who was also, of course, one of the big supporters of the defeated "reform" bill). This proposal, which already has bipartisan support, would give illegal immigrants who are high school graduates a path to U.S. citizenship if they complete two years of college or military service. Durbin has attached his inspiration as an amendment to some military authorization legislation that the Senate is expected to take up in September. Now, who could possibly oppose such a sweet little idea? The illegal immigrants in question are, after all, already high school graduates, which speaks well for their general ability. And if they top that off with two years in college, or two years of service in the military, who could possibly argue that they are not the very sort of people America should long to welcome as citizens?

So this teensy little exception in favor of a particularly choice category of illegal aliens is quite likely to be whooped through Congress next month as an amendment to a military authorization bill, with the moist-eyed approval of all right-thinking people. And behind it, as further amendments to other pieces of virtuous legislation, will come special treatment for all sorts of other favored categories of illegal immigrants: those, say, who have children in the top third of their grade-school class, etc. (And, of course, the wives or husbands and close relatives of these chosen few -- for who would be so cruel as to sunder families?)

And when all the exceptions have been made for all the imaginable categories of particularly deserving illegal immigrants, who would argue against continuing to exclude the rest? The unfortunate who served only 18 months in the military, or whose adorable child is only in the second third of her grade-school class?

ILLEGAL ALIEN "CONTRIBUTIONS" TO THE U.S.

2006 (First Quarter) INS/FBI Statistical Report on Undocumented Immigrants

CRIME

95 % of Warrants in LOS ANGELES are for ILLEGAL ALIENS
83 % of Warrants for MURDER in Phoenix Arizona are FOR ILLEGAL ALIENS
86 % of Warrants for MURDER in Albuquerque New Mexico are for ILLEGAL ALIENS
75 % of those on the most wanted list in Los Angeles, Phoenix, Albuquerque are ILLEGAL ALIENS
24.9 % OF ALL INMATES in California detention centers are Mexican Nationals here ILLEGALLY
40.1 % of all inmates in Arizona detention centers are Mexican Nationals here ILLEGALLY
29 % (630,000) Convicted ILLEGAL ALIENS felons fill our state and federal prisons at the cost of $1.5 Billion Annually
53 % Plus of all investigated burglaries reported in California, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and Texas are perpetrated by ILLEGAL ALIENS
50 % Plus of all gang members in Los Angeles are ILLEGAL ALIENS
71 % Plus of all apprehended Cars stolen in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and California were stolen by ILLEGAL ALIENS or "Transport Coyotes "
47 % of cited / stopped Drivers in California have NO License, NO Insurance, and NO Registration for the vehicle of that 47 %, over 92 % were ILLEGAL ALIENS
63 % of cited / stopped Drivers in Arizona have NO License, NO Insurance, and NO Registration for the vehicle of that 63 %, over 97 % are ILLEGAL ALIENS
66 % of cited / stopped Drivers in New Mexico have NO License, NO Insurance, and NO Registration for the vehicle Of that 66 %, over 98 % were ILLEGAL ALIENS

BIRTHS

380,000 Plus "ANCHOR BABIES" were born in the U.S. in 2005 to ILLEGAL ALIEN PARENTS, making 380,000 babies automatically U.S. Citizens
97.2% of all costs incurred from those births were paid for by American taxpayers.
66 % OF all births in California are to illegal alien Mexicans on Medi-Cal whose births were paid by taxpayers

HOUSING

300,000 plus illegal aliens in Los Angeles Country are living in garages
Nearly 60 % of all occupants of HUD properties in the United States are illegal aliens.

TV & RADIO STATIONS

14 out of 31 TV stations in L.C. are Spanish only 16 out of 28 TV stations in Phoenix are Spanish only
15 out of 24 TV stations in Albuquerque are Spanish only
21 radio stations in Los Angeles are Spanish only
17 radio stations in Los Angeles are Spanish only
17 radio stations in Albuquerque are Spanish only

SCHOOLS

39% plus of California students in grades 1-12 are illegal aliens and 42% plus are non-English speaking
In Los Angeles County, 5.1 million people speak English - 3.9 million speak Spanish

SOCIAL SERVICES

43 % of all Food Stamps issued are to illegal aliens
41 % of all Unemployment Checks in the United States are to illegal aliens
58 % of all Welfare payments in the United States are issued to illegal aliens
Less than 2 % of illegal aliens are picking crops but 41 % are on welfare

POPULATION

Over 70% of the U.S. annual population growth (and over 90% of CA, FL, and NY) results from immigration

EMPLOYER PROFITS

The estimated profit to U.S. corporations and businesses employing illegal aliens in 2005 was more than 2.36 trillion

TAXES

62 % of all "undocumented immigrants" in the U.S. are working for cash and not paying taxes, predominantly illegal aliens are working without a green card
The cost of immigration to the American taxpayer in 1997 (last known calculation by Professor Donald Huddle, Rice University) was a NET (after subtracting taxes immigrants pay), $70 Billion per year. [What are the 2006 costs?]
The lifetime fiscal impact (taxes paid minus services used) for the average illegal alien is $55,000 cost to the American taxpayer in a 5-year span.
You personally pay $11,000 every year to illegal aliens.
JOBS (per Center for Immigration Studies - September 2006): Between 2000 and 2005, 4.1 million immigrant workers arrived in the U.S., accounting for 86% of the net increase in the total number of employed persons (16 & older), the highest share ever recorded in the U.S. Of the 4.1 million, between 1.4 and 2.7 million are estimated to be illegal aliens.
Between 2000 and 2005, the number of young (16 to 34) native-born men employed declined by 1.7 million - at the same time, the number of new male immigrant workers increased by 1.9 million.

These two cousins stated how they wanted to return home to their families and start their own business. They each saved over 30,000 in 4 or 5 years.

That's been the program for a long time. Work cheap, evade taxes, and send it back to Mexico where the cost of (rural) living is 1/5th that of the U.S. and one can buy a little business or 2 bedroom hom WITH TOILET for less than 30K.

I heard Camarata (sp?) from CIS on the radio yesterday and he made a good point.

Seems that he and I are about the same age, and he held many of the jobs that I did through high school and college (dishwasher, landscaping, construction, etc). The jobs that illegals have today.

His pay rate analysis was spot-on: from 1975 to about 1980 construction laborers were paid about $8/hr (as I was). Just on an adjusted $$$ basis, laborers should be making $18/hr so today, but in fact illegals are making $10 to $14/hr, which is about 1/2 to 3/4 the labor rate of the late-1970's. Camarata said this is true across the board, in every single job category crowded with illegal aliens.

To me that explains why the whining contractor says "But illegals are the only people I can get, American kids and unskilled don't want to work anymore", and Camarata's reply, (paraphrased) "Because you're underpaying and getting lower quality American applicants. If you paid $18/hr - which is the proper pay scale - you'd get better American applicants."

By the way, the unemployment rate among high school and college kids, as well as the unskilled, low-skilled, and lesser educated native Americans, is huge. Camarata said something like 10 million and 30 million respectively.

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