Correct. It's also "humane", and "playing by the rules". This is a point that needs to be turned back onto those who want to excuse and exempt both law enforcement and employers from following the rules(aka "the Law").
kabar, your post #613 was an excellent, succinct and accurate summation of the sophistry of politicians using vague language to camouflage the reality of their intentions.
I would add, regarding Palin, that although I have defended her in some of these threads against what I consider to be hysterical and factually dishonest accusations and attacks, this issue of illegal immigration will be the one with the greatest likelihood of destroying her political viability.
Once she is forced to specifically define her terms, as you did, I do believe she will demonstrate she is much closer to McCain's and the Republican establishment position than you or I, and a great many of our FRiends here can tolerate. She is walking a semantic tightrope right now, just as most other politicians naturally want to do, but that cannot be allowed to persist until the nomination, of "whoever", is a fait accompli.
One other observation about Palin. I believe her likely misguided position derives in large part from two factors. The first is simple ignorance of the issue(and I mean that in the non-judgmental sense of lacking knowledge). Alaska is just about as far removed geographically and culturally from the multiple crises that are manifesting themselves in those areas of the country that are being practically overrun by illegals, and the levels of crime, disease, etc. that are rampant.
The second factor is, I believe, cultural and philosophical. Alaska is our last frontier state. It was built by people who were willing to uproot themselves and tackle the challenges of building new lives for themselves and their families. There is an understandable, natural tendency for someone like Palin to buy into the meme, touted by McCain and others, that the illegals just want to do the same for their families as well.
As you, Charles, and many others of us know, however, the matter is far more complicated than that. I believe Palin is not fully up to speed on the "facts on the ground" for this issue, and she really does need to educate herself. And, I hope Palin and/or her people read Free Republic and will consider these things.
For myself, I will continue to support and defend Palin from the sort of hysterical, vulgar and dishonest attacks she has received on these threads, but after this last obligation to McCain is satisfied she must clarify and specifically define her terms on this issue, and take specific policy positions. Waiting or stalling until the 2012 primarys is not acceptable.
My view was more practical and pragmatic. Back when we had 4.5% unemployment, an argument could be made that to some extent, illegals weren’t hurting americans looking for work (although I wanted the bill to address that specifically by adding protections for american workers in the H1B and other visa programs).
SO I looked at illegals who for years were given a wink and a nod. They lived on our streets, spoke OUR language, were integrated into OUR culture. They had jobs, they owned businesses that employed americans. They paid their mortgages, kept their property neat, served on the PTA. These were people who, if you had to judge who to let in, are exactly what you’d hope you’d get.
There only problem, a major one, is that they broke the rules to get here. So I figure, for this small subset, maybe it’s 1 or 2 million out of the 12 million, that have been here a long time, that we essentially ENCOURAGED to break the rules (since the legal immigration system was broken — another thing I wanted to fix in the bill), that we would impose a fine, issue a temporary work visa, and let them put their name on the BOTTOM of the list for immigration.
And if others were found that would be better suited than these people who lived here, and we had met our quota, then we’d give THOSE people visas to come into the country, and send our current neighbors home — but as I said, we started with the few that already had proven their worth to our country.
Under my plan, nobody would be eligible to stay if they had forged a social security number, had not paid their taxes, or had any convictions more serious than a speeding ticket. If they had accepted government checks, they were gone — we would only grant this special privilege to those who had real jobs and had proven they wanted to be Americans, not hyphenated people looking to change our country.
I know a lot of people didn’t agree with me. And now that we have 10% unemployment, we don’t have free jobs for people who cheated.
I often used the example of people sneaking into a rock concert, and sitting in other people’s seats. When the concert isn’t very crowded, we can force the interlopers to pay for a seat, and a penalty for cheating, and move them to seats that aren’t taken — we don’t have to kick them out of the stadium.
But when the stadium is sold out, there are no free slots, and we need to send them home. They can’t benefit from cheating.