Posted on 11/05/2001 10:55:50 AM PST by dennisw
I don't know if I would agree, I think some of the terrorists were here legally, but let's assume that Schlafly's assertion here is true. Now, let's go to a subsequent claim:
ID Card: Password to the Police State
Well, I'm really curious how we are gonna fully combat illegal aliens without a national ID card. How is a cop going to know if someone is an illegal without it?
I have a few libertarian tendencies, but that is beside the point I was raising. I see lots of folks demanding a crackdown on illegal immigration - but since we've left the sluicegates on our borders full open for so long, exactly how are you gonna tell the illegals from the legals any more without some kind of ID card? Heck, I just saw an article in the Rocky Mountain News about a clerk who was caught selling Drivers Licenses to illegals. The current ID system is a joke, and a booming business exists trafficking fakes. A computerized national ID card is the only way I see to correct the problem, so our decision, IMO, comes down to coping with the illegals in our midst or issuing an ID card to help get rid of them. It's an ugly dilemna.
I don't know if 9/11 is going to change that fact either. Last April, China forced down one of our planes in international airspace, kept the crew hostage for ten days, forced us to chop up and crate out the plane, and then gave us a "bill" for their expenses. Our response? Grease the skids for their entrance into the WTO. It's the same with immigration: illegal "guest workers" will continue to flow over our southern border, take jobs and government benefits, commit crimes, breed, vote, and eventually govern discrete regions of the US. Young men with ghastly staring eyes from Saudi Arabia and other "moderate" Arab states will continue to get visas of some kind or other---maybe not "student visas" any more---to come to the US and "study" our infrastructure and technology---or maybe they'll just sneak over the Mexican or Canadian border.
You'll see---all this talk about immigration restrictions and reform will come to virtually nothing. With our political and business elites, the "bottom line" is more important than our bottoms any day of the week.
This is all that you can say about illegal immigration? That it's OK and can't be fought unless a national ID is used?
Can a cop ask for an id from a suspected criminal?
Is illegal immigration a crime?
First institute a system that would make hiring illegals impossible or very costly. Then offer them free transportation to the border.
Most of the illegals can barely speak English. Most of them are also brown and work at car washes and construction sites. They also blow leaves and dig ditches.
Illegals are here only because they can find a job and no one bothers them. As soon as their life becomes more difficult, they'll ask for a free ticket back to their home countries. The troublemakers need to be arrested and deported.
Plenty of legals do that kind of work as well. You gonna profile Mexicans? Might get my wife sucked in - she's fourth generation American, but ethnically hispanic. Speaks English just fine, but how do you tell she's American?
Illegals are here only because they can find a job and no one bothers them. As soon as their life becomes more difficult, they'll ask for a free ticket back to their home countries. The troublemakers need to be arrested and deported.
You really think they are gonna be in any hurry to go back to their hellholes at home? Hard times in the United States is still a lot better than good times in the mother country...
Schlafley asks the right question! I've often grumbled that if the feds had spied on the real enemies of this country instead of (mostly) conservatives, maybe they'd have averted 9/11.
An ID card for aliens would not infringe on native born or naturalized persons' rights.
An alien ID card would have to be interactive and require check-in at frequent intervals - we've probably got that technology already.
Such a card would not solve the problem - but it would provide a basis for other actions such as,
An EO requiring that everyone here on a visa etc. obtain a card within 14 days - failure equals depotation when & if cought.
Authorizing local authority to arrest and detain illegals who do not comply - fed's could pay a carrying cost to the locals.
Advise our "friends" overseas (or the river) that all costs of the program will be prorated out of any foreign aid they might have expected - AND that repeated offenses will have a negative on aid they might want in the future.
Mandatory sentencing of illegals when cought at any crime - starting with seizure of assets and deportation of the offender and immediate family. (Capital crimes to be dealt with with respect for a "speedy trial" without recourse to appeal.)
Foreign officials found to be aiding or encouraging illegal immigration to be tried in abstencia, declared to be terrorists themselves, and their home governments fined as indicated above.
None of these suggestions involves "profiling" as such - they do recognize that the US has an obligation to (a) its CITIZENS and to those who come here for (b) legally, for (c) valid reasons, but not necessarily to the world's flotsam and jetsam.
Here's the problem with that approach - what if someone just refuses to use the card after they enter the country? Think about it. How are you going to tell the card-carrying aliens from citizens at a given checkpoint?
After 9/11 the country moved quickly to take away our right to not have our homes invaded. Why isn't the author troubled by this?
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