Pelosi & Reid Commit to Immigration Reform
Harry Reid (D-NV)
An item in yesterday’s Congress Daily said that Nancy Pelosi “told the Asian American and Pacific Islander Summit this morning that Congress would tackle immigration reform after finishing with health care and energy.” CD opined that “it seems unlikely that Congress could work through all three mega-issues this year” but Pelosi didn’t say that. Harry Reid, meanwhile, explicitly said he thought immigration could be done this year:
“As far as I’m concerned, we have three major issues we have to do this year, if at all possible: No. 1 is healthcare; No 2 is energy, global warming; No. 3 is immigration reform,” Reid said. “It’s going to happen this session, but I want it this year, if at all possible.”
Obviously, this still may not happen. But it’s good to hear. In the immediate wake of the Sonia Sotomayor announcement, you sometimes heard that now that we’re getting a Latina justice, there’s no need to do immigration reform. The reality, however, is that the presence of huge numbers of undocumented immigrants in the United States is a very real problem that needs to be confronted. Efforts to make any other kind of social policy—be it health care, higher education, labor law reform, whatever—wind up being complicated by the problem. You could try to solve the problem in an impractical and inhumane manner by deporting everyone, or you can try to find a practical way of getting law-abiding people paying taxes on put on a path to citizenship. Just trying to ignore the issue isn’t going to viable.
59 Responses to “Pelosi & Reid Commit to Immigration Reform”
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June 4th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
Damn! I was hoping they’d be able to fit the manned expedition to Mars in there somewehere.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Also, we’re still going to build bike paths.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:37 pm
I’m not a conservative, but living as I do in California, I think I understand how the politics of resentment play out. Most voters don’t want amnesty, and vote accordingly.
And if immigration reform passes before the midterm elections, all that will mean is that the dems will lose about 20-25% more seats than the already would.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Most voters don’t want amnesty, and vote accordingly.
And if immigration reform passes before the midterm elections, all that will mean is that the dems will lose about 20-25% more seats than the already would.
You do realize that the reform plan being floated has wide popular support, right? Consistently in the 60-70% range. Just like it did a few years ago, before the hardcore minority of Rush listeners torpedoed it. Don’t confuse them with the rest of the country.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
I’m not a conservative, but living as I do in California, I think I understand how the politics of resentment play out.
Step 1: Republicans take hard line on immigration.
Step 2: Republicans lose every major election in the state for about a decades, until finally settling on the most famous immigrant in the country as their candidate.
Is that it?
June 4th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
Also, the most likely scenario is that the Dems lose something like 10 House seats (while gaining in the Senate). So if the downside of immigration reform is that they lose 2 more in a chamber where they have a huge majority…I really don’t see that impacting anyone’s decision.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Did someone really suggest that there was no need for immigration reform because a Hispanic woman was nominated to the Supreme Court?
That’s pretty stupid.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Yeah, because god knows we need a guest worker program. 30 years of wage stagnation clearly isn’t enough.
Thne most likely result of that is no change in the next election, and a Republican majority in 10 years. I’m not sure any of you really understand the impact of having a slave class of some 3-4 million people in America.
June 4th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
I mean, holy shit. First you scumbag so-called liberals ship all of our factory jobs overseas so your pay-masters don’t have to pay the prevailing wage in America.
Now you want to import slaves to steal our service-sector jobs. WTF is wrong with you people?
June 4th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
I’m pretty sure you don’t know the meaning of the word “slave”. But please consider that a life of evading the cops because you’re not allowed to work in this country legally is pretty far from most people’s conception of “freedom”.
Um, I think you’re thinking of the GOP. That’s assuming that you’re thinking at all, of course, which I don’t see any evidence of.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
#9: You’re chronically hysterically overreacting. Did anyone on this thread talk about a guest worker program? It’s not the one being proposed now or discussed, nor is it being proposed by anyone in this thread.
And, just out of curiosity, how exactly is a guest worker program (however odious) “most likely” to lead to a Republican majority? I would love to see a flowchart on that one. As for the slave class, it’s well over 3-4 million as is.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
What’s sad is that George Bush proposed a pretty good plan and it went nowhere. I don’t praise Bush often, but he was right on this issue. No surprise, he’s from a border state. But this issue needs to be resolved and people are willing to do it. We have the 60 votes it takes to do anything in the Senate, so the time is now. Yes, the Tom Tancredos and Rush Limbaughs will scream to Heaven about it, but ignore them. There is a consensus and there is a need. So pass the reform. This is one thing we can do pretty easily. Rather than fight over what is difficult, let’s pass some legislation that we agree upon.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
You could try to solve the problem in an impractical and inhumane manner by deporting everyone, or you can try to find a practical way of getting law-abiding people paying taxes on put on a path to citizenship.
Not to state the obvious or anything, but these are illegal immigrants so calling them law abiding sorta misses the point. By definition they have broken immigration laws. Saying they abide by other laws (some do, some don’t) is immaterial since we are discussing what to do vis-a-vis the laws they have actually broken. Saying they deserve to be forgiven for breaking one law because they haven’t broken another law is like saying we should give amnesty to all burglers who have not also killed anyone. If you want to argue for forgiveness for illegal immigrants arguing on behalf of their lawfulness is unlikely to win any converts.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
It’s pretty clear that the Democrats are every bit as bought and paid for by corporate interests as the Republicans.
The bottom line is that you’re all too fucking cofmortable to give a shit about poor people in this country. You just want cheap labor, cheap nannies, and cheap crap. You don’t give a flying fuck that wages haven’t gone up for 30 years. You
Why don’t you be charitable with your own god damned money and your own god damned jobs. Fight for more H1B Visas instead of opening the fucking floodgates and forcing low income Americans to compete with workers who have no fucking recourse.
Why the fuck should anyone trust you after the last two decades of BS that people like you have been shoveling around to cover for your own fucking greed?
Gee, I wonder why someone who isn’t fucking well-off like you fuckers would be ‘hysterical’. You people haven’t had to watch your jobs go to some un-unionized farmer from south America who will gladly work to send his 3$ an hour back to Mexico. No, because you assholes make sure to NEVER allow immigrants to compete with you.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:15 pm
I’d rather not think than not care.
It’ pretty fucking obvious that none of you give a shit about Americans who make under 30k a year. A two income household makes on average 40k a fucking year.
Yet you assholes don’t see a fucking problem with the fact that most Americans make 20k a year. You clearly think they don’t even deserve to make that much, or you wouldn’t be trying to flood their industries with cheap foriegn labor.
I’m not the one not thinking here. I know when someone is trying to fuck me. You’re the ones not thinking, because you actually think you’re the good guys here. You’re not, you’re the same classist shitheads that would be voting for Republicans right now if the war had gone a little better.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
What’s sad is that George Bush proposed a pretty good plan and it went nowhere. I don’t praise Bush often, but he was right on this issue
He said that was his biggest regret. But I know I know, Bush was the worst President evah. (he was good on foreign AIDS policy too. And Bernanke was a good apointment.)
June 4th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
I’d rather not think than not care.
It’ pretty fucking obvious that none of you give a shit about Americans who make under 30k a year. A two income household makes on average 40k a fucking year.
Yet you assholes don’t see a fucking problem with the fact that most Americans make 20k a year. You clearly think they don’t even deserve to make that much, or you wouldn’t be trying to flood their industries with cheap foriegn labor.
I’m not the one not thinking here. I know when someone is trying to fuck me. You’re the ones not thinking, because you actually think you’re the good guys here. You’re not, you’re the same classist shitheads that would be voting for Republicans right now if the war had gone a little better.
Fuck! But “cheap foreign labor” are human beings with rights. And potential voters.
But I think you’re right, if the Iraq war had gone better many people wouldn’t have been so down on it later on.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:38 pm
soullite: if “comprehensive reform” comes out as “amnesty” and nothing else, then you’re right to be vocal in your opposition.
If it actually means “comprehensive reform”, which means getting rid of stupid visas (H1-B) and stupid loopholes and creating a bureaucracy and enforcement infrastructure that isn’t decrepit, obsolescent and incoherent, then it deserves to be supported.
Personally, I don’t think it’ll happen before the end of the year. Which means that it won’t happen until after the mid-terms. Better to have a good bill that takes time to explain to the public, and reflects public concerns about wage pressure, than to attempt to push it through quickly and cede the high ground to nativist fucks like Loud Obbs who think the only immigration system the US needs is a minefield and a 30-foot fence along the border.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
“Fight for more H1B Visas”
I do fight for more. In fact, I’m already fighting for one for my Tibetan friend in India. But we should do more. For every H1B visa we grant, we should grant a college education for someone in that country so we don’t cause a brain drain there. And the people who get those H1B visas wouldn’t really mind having a little tax on them to pay for it. It costs about $3,000 to put a kid through college in India. Hell, I’ve put four kids through college in India, and I’ve only met one of them. And that’s the guy I’m trying to get an H1B visa for. He’d gladly pay someone else’s college education just to get a chance to work here. Let’s put it this way, the cost of a college education in a developing country is less than the lawyer’s fees it takes to come here. I know there is a desperate need to keep lawyers in business, but it is nowhere near the desperate need to fund education.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:45 pm
And that’s the guy I’m trying to get an H1B visa for. He’d gladly pay someone else’s college education just to get a chance to work here.
Perhaps I’m missing the point, fostert, but I’m incredibly curious: why exactly are you so desperate to get this guy a job in the US?
June 4th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
Oddly enough, I just commented on this on my homepage linked above, and I’ll provide a shortcut here. At the event, Reid said:
Now, compare that statement to what I tell you here. Reid is either promoting a fantasy, or he’d allow thousands of criminals to be legalized as well as an untold number of terrorists. Maybe MattY could ask him which it is.
If anyone wants to find out what’s really going on with this issue, please subscribe to my feed or search my archives.
To see why, compare all the things I tell you about this issue to what MattY tells you. You might be comforted by not learning all the things involved, but isn’t it better to know the truth?
June 4th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
“It’ pretty fucking obvious that none of you give a shit about Americans who make under 30k a year.”
Calm down there. I’ll admit that I make quite bit more than that. But to say I don’t care is absurd. I have a homeless person living in my house right now. He lost his job as a cashier at Safeway and has nowhere to go. Well, nowhere but my house. So don’t tell me that I don’t care. And this is hardly the first time I’ve taken in the homeless. My attitude is that I take what I need and give away the rest. Fortunately, my business is such that I give away quite a lot.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Re: First you scumbag so-called liberals ship all of our factory jobs overseas so your pay-masters don’t have to pay the prevailing wage in America.
Um, who shipped jobs overseas?
Hint: Major corporations are generally run by conservative guys who vote Republican.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
Adam writes: You do realize that the reform plan being floated has wide popular support, right? Consistently in the 60-70% range.
Adam is, of course, an idiot. Those polls show little more than how well lies from the MSM and politicians are working. If those polls discussed all the downsides of “reform”, they’d be in the 10% range.
Regarding Duvall’s comment, the GOP has never really approached this issue in an effective way due to a combination of corruption and stupidity. If they could overcome that, they could eviscerate the Dem Party.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
Regarding MattY’s second link, I respond to it in Why is John Podesta of CAP willing to hurt American nurses and teachers?
Please compare what I tell you at that link with anything MattY, Podesta, or CAP tell you about this topic.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
“Perhaps I’m missing the point, fostert, but I’m incredibly curious: why exactly are you so desperate to get this guy a job in the US?”
Because he’s my friend. And he lives in India, which sucks compared to here. The Indian government has been gracious in accepting the Tibetans, but they won’t grant citizenship. He wants to be a citizen of some country not named ‘China.’
June 4th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Not to state the obvious or anything, but these are illegal immigrants so calling them law abiding sorta misses the point. By definition they have broken immigration laws.
This mindset is a big stumbling block in the way of any meaningful reform. Living to the country illegally usually qualifies as a victimless crime. The kind of crime that occurs when someone smokes a joint, or participates in a friendly game of chance. Yet people who do this sort of thing regularly are very often well characterized as law abiding citizens, because the crimes they commit cause no actual harm.
Immigration reform that refuses to take into account real life labor markets is doomed to be ineffective. Government bureaucracies are simply ill suited to gauge the demands of the market. Quotas for immigrants are not likely to be any more realistic than quotas for imported beer or sneakers.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:17 pm
Oh, and ShutTheFuckUp, lonewacko.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
On illegal immigration threads I can hardly ever resit pointing out the logistical difficulties in deporting 11 million people.
It is a huge number of people! If we could round-up, process and put 200 people per hour on to planes and buses it seems to me we would be working fast (one family of four, every hour in every state). If we could ship 200 people per hour across the border, 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, it would take more than 6 years to deport everyone.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
I’ll agree soullite *may* be a bit over the top, but in so many words I’ve said the same thing in the past. Previous amnesty has worked to get families stable, including guys my wife used to work with.
BUT, this is against a background of massive, continuing undocumented immigration, and the fact that while capital is very mobile, labor is not. I cannot just “go” to China, India, or Mexico to sell my labor (or start a business) unless I want to end up in even deeper kimche than our own new arrivals.
People piss and moan about the new border fence because it looks like shit, or because it’s “inhumane”. But, to the degree that any barrier “works”, the completed portions do what they’re intended to do. Beyond that, what have we got to prevent a decade-long cycle of building up an enormous mass of undocumented, granting mass amnesties, rinse and repeat?
When voters react to immigration issues, I think they’re 1) reacting against the “send the beaners home” crowd, and 2) support enabling people to protect themselves against undue exploitation. I don’t think they’re signing on for the unplanned cycle in the previous paragraph.
What are the rationales for continuing like this?
June 4th, 2009 at 5:36 pm
1. At this site especially, many of those pretending to be Dems are in fact libertarians. Those of you who are Dems should consider the source. And, in the case of libertarians, they don’t support things like the minimum wage, safety standards, and so on. For more on the libertarian dream, read Dickens.
2. Libertarians and others fail to note all the other, extremely pernicious impacts of what they support. For instance, IllegalImmigration isn’t a “victimless crime”. IllegalImmigration is a clear indicator of PoliticalCorruption, and that has an impact on everyone in the U.S.
3. Many have offered a FalseChoice between legalization and MassDeportations when other options are available, such as attrition.
4. Please compare what I tell you about this topic – and how easily I’m able to point out how others are lying about this topic – to what MattY writes.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:36 pm
There are about 10-12 million illegal/undocumented aliens in the United States. Over the years, they have had U.S. citizen children, worked at jobs, bought houses, and (gasp!) paid taxes. I worry about security issues but I would rather have a system where people could come out of the shadows and be put on a pathway to some type of status than the status quo. There is no way we can or should deport 10-12 million people. Seriously, what would this country look like with regular stops by police and raids in churches and schools to check “papers.” And don’t hold your breath that people will self-deport in numbers large enough to make a difference with this current “attrition by enforcement” kick.
So, I say let’s check our emotions and tackle this issue. Some will stay, some will go. But we aren’t going to get anywhere if both parties treat this as an all or nothing proposition.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:37 pm
*applause for cmholm*
I’d be happy to support amnesty and a path to citizenship for the illegal immigrants here now if we got serious about border enforcement to prevent future waves of mass immigration. The amount of immigration we are undergoing is too large for this country to sustain, both politically and economically, at least for those of us who didn;t graduate from Dalton and Harvard. But I simply do not trust the pro-immigration crowd to allow serious border enforcement.
June 4th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
At least Bob Oso isn’t engaging in a FalseChoice, he’s just misleading about how much impact it would have if we were serious about attrition. Millions of people would indeed leave the U.S. over time if they knew they weren’t going to be legalized, if work dried up, and if non-emergency services were gradually reduced. Combined with putting pressure on Mexico to take care of their own people, that would work to reduce the numbers here now and, just as importantly, reduce the numbers trying to come here.
Any form of “reform” would give additional power to the MexicanGovernment and far-left and racial power groups. All those currently oppose enforcement, meaning that anyone who tells you that “reform” would reduce future flows is lying to you.
Enforcing the current laws is the only reasonable and humanitarian solution, once you actually think everything through.
If you want to block “reform”, here’s how.
June 4th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
“if they knew they weren’t going to be legalized, if work dried up, and if non-emergency services were gradually reduced.”
That’s a lot of ifs, and I am being misleading? My point is this, you can’t deport everyone or hope that they get tired and leave. You need to figure out what is going to be done with those that remain. Just opposing any reform and hoping they leave is not going to cut it.
Any form of “reform” would give additional power to the MexicanGovernment and far-left and racial power groups. All those currently oppose enforcement, meaning that anyone who tells you that “reform” would reduce future flows is lying to you.
What are talking about specifically and how?
June 4th, 2009 at 6:18 pm
You’ll notice their is no mention of a concomitant strengthening and proper enforcement of labor standards. I am not, necessarily, talking about about penalizing the immigrant workers themselves; just that they shouldn’t be used as a wedge against American labor.
June 4th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
Enforcing the current laws is the only reasonable and humanitarian solution.
Which laws are they, precisely?
How do you propose to pay for the cost of “enforcing the current laws”, and what infrastructure do you propose to make it possible to do so?
Answer in the space provided.
June 4th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
1. If a few million IllegalAliens still won’t leave after a few years of attrition, and if few new people are coming here illegally, then that’s not so much of an issue. Any problems they’d have are of their own choosing; no one would be forcing them to remain here. Over time, most would leave.
2. If opponents did things the right way, all those “ifs” would come to pass sooner or later except in places like S.F. and other lawless areas.
3. For Bob Oso’s edification, the MexicanGovernment has a great deal of PoliticalPower inside the U.S. due to having what amounts to a FifthColumn. Many MexicanAmericans are sympathetic to that country, but the more serious impact is from leaders who occasionally act like agents of that government, from their links to far-left non-profits, and so on. There are literally too many examples to list.
And, even in those cases where they aren’t working with a foreign government, various far-left groups like the NCLR consistenly oppose enforcement of our laws. Legalization would increase their power base, and those groups would use that enhanced power base to even more effectively oppose enforcement of our laws.
Rather than me adding a hundred links, simply start searching at my site. You’ll find out about all the things that MattY wouldn’t tell you even if he knew about them.
June 4th, 2009 at 6:36 pm
“But, to the degree that any barrier “works”, the completed portions do what they’re intended to do.”
The only thing a fence is intended to do is make people walk around it (or climb over it). Until that fence covers every inch of border in this country and we close down all of our beaches, it will do very little. Where I live, we have a deer fence around the entire block. But if anyone leaves their gate open, deer will come in and eat everyone’s gardens. It only takes one gate, and the deer will find it. I can’t imagine the Mexicans are less intelligent than deer, which are dumb as a rock. And even if you have a fence, that won’t stop the Chinese, they come in shipping containers. Want to stop all trade, too? Fences aren’t the answer. Good policies that allow people to come in and obey the law are. And employment policies that discourage unwanted immigration would go a long way. Don’t want them in your town? Then don’t hire them. If you hire them, then stop bitching.
June 4th, 2009 at 6:47 pm
“fostert” (probably a libertarian) has no clue; I’m not going to waste my time repeating arguments I’ve made again and again on my site especially since I’ve got other things to do.
The bottom line here is this: if we could fit politicians with shock collars that caused them to only support our laws, the problem would be nearly solved. We can’t do that, but we can do something similar.
June 4th, 2009 at 7:04 pm
And thus Lonewacko runs away yet again when asked to answer hard questions.
Hilarious. Perhaps he’s looking for the MexicanWhoBrokeHisSpaceBar.
June 4th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
We currently have a “slave class” of approximately 12 million people in America – undocumented immigrants who have no access to unions or police or most public services, and who live under the constant threat of deportation. The effect of having this “reserve army” on our labor market is pretty horrible.
While a guest worker program wouldn’t be ideal, and the best answer would be to give them all legal status and put them on a pathway to citizenship, it would be a hell of a lot of a lot better for immigrant workers not to have the sword hanging over their heads.
June 4th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
Once again, Matt Yglesias is trying his hardest to convince people that Kevin MacDonald is right.
shecky, you shut up.
fostert:
The fact that peopel will get around a fence does not mean that everyone will get around the fence. A really good fence and really good border enforcement will significantly reduce illegal immigration.
Making it impossible for illegal aliens to get jobs will cause a lot of them to return home.
June 4th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
But I simply do not trust the pro-immigration crowd to allow serious border enforcement.
Absolute border enforcement is a fantasy. And what is serious border enforcement, anyway? If open borders are allowed, border patrol can focus on patrolling for contraband like guns and drugs. Otherwise honest immigrants have little incentive to cross anywhere but an official crossing. And can come and go as they please.
If you mean by “serious border enforcement”, the same immigration policy as now, but with more resources thrown at patrolling the border, then nothing will be really solved.
It has to be understood that immigration is largely driven by market forces. The US, with it’s relatively free economy, consistently demands more labor than it really has. Furthermore, labor is a market like any other. It responds to supply and demand. Which is why the latest trend is for immigrants to not come at all. How many people favor setting limits, or even eliminating immigration, all to save jobs? Yet that kind of artificial limitation is ridiculous if applied to, say, cars or computers or brooms. There needs to be a serious revelation that competitive markets are good for everyone in the long run and that market labor demands are a good thing.
BUT, this is against a background of massive, continuing undocumented immigration, and the fact that while capital is very mobile, labor is not. I cannot just “go” to China, India, or Mexico to sell my labor (or start a business) unless I want to end up in even deeper kimche than our own new arrivals.
This is exactly the reason the US needs to liberalize it’s immigration policy. Because very few people can seek a better life in another country. Namely the US. The really interesting thing is that there is no reason for liberalized immigration policy to be bi-lateral in order for it to be beneficial to the US. Freer markets benefit the US economy more than those abroad, and encourage foreign countries to liberalize their markets, too. Enhanced freedom of movement, even if unilateral, is a huge gain for the US, makes us an example for the rest to follow, and has benefits extending beyond mere freedom of movement.
June 4th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
You have to love the Democratic Party’s economic plan of expanding entitlements, putting an end to the last of heavy industry in the U.S. and opening the borders to everyone else. If you look at California today you will see the direction that Harry Reid wants to take the U.S.
June 4th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
Making it impossible for illegal aliens to get jobs will cause a lot of them to return home
This is a pretty serious dose of medicine. Think about the implications of making such a thing possible, to businesses, individual freedom, government expansion. Think of the actual harm caused by illegal immigration. Think that illegal immigration can be much more easily fought by simply not restricting immigration.
There is a refusal to see immigration for what it is: a matter of supply and demand. Prohibition doesn’t work for the labor market any more than it works for alcohol or pot.
June 4th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Making it impossible for illegal aliens to get jobs will cause a lot of them to return home.
Talk is cheap. How’s that going to happen? Who’s going to pay for it?
June 4th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
1. I’m not going to respond to the local anti-Irish, anti-Catholic troll. If someone who has the guts to provide some form of a permanent identifier wants to ask a detailed question, feel free to ask.
2. “joe from Lowell” forgets to note that over 99% of IllegalAliens are free to leave at any time. Only a small fraction are being held against their will; the rest made a decision of their own free will and do have other options. (Of course, through their support for illegal activity, Dem leaders are also helping those who currently engage in IndenturedServitude right here in the U.S.)
3. Out of all the loony LibertarianIdeas – turning your skin blue, flying a blimp, playing dress-up games – OpenBorders is the looniest of all. That would, for instance, allow foreign countries to send “settlers” here in an attempt to influence our politics.
June 4th, 2009 at 8:21 pm
Hilarious: Lonewacko will not answer hard questions, and is thus a hypocrite as well as a bullshitting ladder-pulling nativist fuck.
June 4th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
Also hilarious: 24Ahead aka Orange Line Special aka NoMoreBlather aka TLB aka Lonewacko demanding a “permanent identifier”. (And that’s missing out a few.)
Especially hilarious: the fact that Lonewacko is both a Birther and a nativist fuck who talks about “enforcing the current laws”. The repercussions of the one obsession on the other haven’t quite occurred to him.
June 4th, 2009 at 10:32 pm
A. Lone Wacko can never answer the point that legalizing immigration will mean fewer, not more, immigrants in an exploited underclass, and it pisses him off. He can’t answer the point, but he can’t leave it alone, either, so he does something like quibble with the use of the word “slave,” which I wrote in response to soulite choosing that term.
(Of course, through their support for immigration restrictions, nativist assholes are also helping those who currently engage in IndenturedServitude right here in the U.S.)
Fixed that for you. You complain about the presence of people exploited by sleazy businesses, but your solution is to make them even more legally vulnerable and subject to exploitation. The American worker thanks you a bunch.
June 4th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
shecky said: This is exactly the reason the US needs to liberalize it’s immigration policy. Because very few people can seek a better life in another country. Namely the US.
This is a non-sequitur.
The really interesting thing is that there is no reason for liberalized immigration policy to be bi-lateral in order for it to be beneficial to the US. Freer markets benefit the US economy more than those abroad…
It benefits those who purchase cheap labor. Is the capital thereby freed in excess of the overall devalued labor? The national economy doesn’t benefit from wholesale reduction in value-added labor.
…and encourage foreign countries to liberalize their markets, too. Enhanced freedom of movement, even if unilateral, is a huge gain for the US, makes us an example for the rest to follow, and has benefits extending beyond mere freedom of movement.
I don’t care if there’s bilaterial policies, and there won’t be, so the point is moot. Other countries could give a rat’s okole how or whether we loosen up our immigration policy, except Mexico and Central America. In fact, in virtually any country with a positive population growth that’s wealthier than it’s neighbors, immigration is unpopular among working people: US v. south, Mexico v. south, Costa Rica v. Nicaragua, Nigeria v. west, S. Africa v. north, and the list goes on.
June 4th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
1. Here’s an example of some real reporting you won’t hear from anyone else. Let me be frank: that page is an IQ/integrity test, and few have passed it.
2. joe from Lowell doesn’t realize that, while legalization will reduce the “exploited underclass”, that effect will only be temporary. Due to the message it will send as well as the fact that it will give even more power to those who oppose our laws, the “exploited underclass” will simply rebuild, as it did following the last “reform” in 1986.
And, if our laws were enforced, it would be much less easy for those who engage in IndenturedServitude right here, right now to get away with it. Nowadays they’re able to hide what they’re doing within the general IllegalAlien population; with many few IllegalAliens, they’d be much easier to root out.
My solution would result in millions more people having many more rights than they have now… back in their home countries. If the leftwing wanted to advocate for changes in those home countries that would be a reasonable position. Instead, all they do is support massive illegal activity and make things worse all around.
June 5th, 2009 at 12:00 am
Think that illegal immigration can be much more easily fought by simply not restricting immigration
Instead of all of this business about fighting rape, think that rape can be much more easily prevented by simply consenting.
June 5th, 2009 at 12:14 am
Ah, the BirtherWacko moment.
Since the dipshit shut-in took the bait: if Chris Kelly (the mental case behind the decade-long Lonewacko blogwhoring enterprise) can produce sufficient evidence — unredacted scanned copies on his shitty blog will do — to prove to my satisfaction that he is a US citizen, I’ll post under the name on my birth certificate.
If not? Well, perhaps someone can do it for him. He likes that idea, but no-one seems particularly enthused.
For all his sputtering and Know-Nothing piss and vinegar (despising Pat Buchanan makes one ‘anti-Catholic’? who knew?) Lonewacko’s Birther fixation has revealed that he’s not just a hypocrite and a coward and a relentless pathetic blogwhore, but also understands, without admitting it, the cost and infrastructure required to do effective immigration enforcement in a federal nation that combines dysfunctional federal bureaucracy with widely divergent state bureaucracies.
June 5th, 2009 at 7:46 am
How does opening the borders to everyone going to help the U.S. lower its green house gas emissions and lower its energy consumption. How does opening the borders help the schools improve and produce citizens capable of competing in the world marketplace. How does opening the borders help make healthcare affordable, or decrease suburban sprawl, or lower the violent crime rate?
If you look at all of the goals of progressives, they should be leading the effort for closing the borders and deporting illegal aliens. Instead, the progressives show their true colors by pushing for open borders and unlimited immigration that will produce millions or automatic Democratic voters and greatly increase the demand for government services.
June 5th, 2009 at 11:14 am
A credo you seem to insist upon proving with every post you make. You might want to consider doing both.
Without reform, nothing will be done. Illegal immigrants will continue to be here. As it is, you are competing with people who are hampered in their negotiations because of their lack of legal status. They compensate for that by working for less. If they try to organize, they get deported, so they don’t organize.
Or, you can compete against workers who are here legally, who can demand high wages, who can freely organize – organize alongside native-born workers. If they do so, a company no longer gains the benefit of paying an illegal half what they have to pay a legal worker.
June 5th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
I suppose we could terminate most commerce with Mexico, create a quarter-mile desolate kill-zone, erect a multilayer system of barbed-wire fences with machinegun towers and minefields patrolled by about 100,000 border guards, a 5 mile strip of land subject to intense monitoring in which only specific people were allowed, another 10 mile strip of land saturated with checkpoints, whose residents are required to have papers on them at alltimes.
That’s the Iron Curtain. It cut illegal emigration down to about 60,000 per year.
You get much more bang for the buck going after employers. Give employers a larger legal workforce, and harsher penalties for using illegals, and they won’t hire illegals. If there are no jobs, fewer will come.
June 5th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
You get much more bang for the buck going after employers. Give employers a larger legal workforce, and harsher penalties for using illegals, and they won’t hire illegals. If there are no jobs, fewer will come.
That’s true. That’s why we need Obama to mandate the use of E-Verify for employment eligibility checks, NOW. The most effective way to reduce illegal immigration is through attrition (don’t let them get jobs, and they leave).