Jun 14 2006
National Security Over Mass Deportation
Deporting millions of illegal workers will waste law enforcement resources and put America at greater risk of missing a possible terrorist attack. Case in point, the 55 illegal workers picked up at Dulles Airport, 12 minutes from my house and the notorious Herndon Day Worker Center. This is why Reps who draw out a comprehensive solution are risking all our lives for some fantasiful idea of perfection. I doubt the workers were a risk to air transportation, but the fact is they have access to a very sensitive area at the airport. If we had background checks and IDs, etc. we would have a better chance of detecting a risk than this madness of a massive underground workforce. We must find the most expidited path to cull harmless workers from potential threats. And the fastest way is for the harmless workers to step forward on their own and submit to background checks, assimilation and a guest worker program. Worrying about 12 million ‘undocumented’ workers over the removal of this massive haystack of humanity to find the needles of terrorism is clear to anyone with a sense of urgency about our national security. the far right fighting an 80-20 battle against a lost cause.
If 90% of the immigrants are harmless and we can get them to come into the light of day that reduces our problem from 12 million people to 1.2 million people to deal with. Our security and law enforcement force is the same size no matter which problem we take on. If we waste precious time and cycles chasing workers and not risks we will pay in our own blood. What price purity?
AJ,
I’m an “Open Border” advocate. I don’t think there should be any immigration quotas. Everyone’s invited, except criminals. The only requirement is that they pay a fee of $500 per year until they become citizens. That money would be held in a Roth style IRA until the person became a citizen. If the immigrant never became a citizen, the money would be released to them when they reached Social Security Full Retirement Age.
That’s my solution to this mess, but I guess it’s too simple.
I agree “90% of the immigrants are harmless”, it is the other 100% illegal immigrants which are of concern.
What evidence do you have which supports the idea that the undocumented “massive haystack of humanity” is harmless?
Can we agree that the focus point to this debate is about illegal immigration and not legal immigration. Why do you continue to ignore this important distinction?
That said, “what price purity”? Certainly not the massive cattle drive of human slaves necessary to support ‘jobs Americans won’t do”.
AJ:
I tend to agree with you because I know that there is only so much law enforcement can do. I don’t want rapists and terrorists running around free while the authorities are bothering with people who are not going to hurt anyone.
We do not lock up everyone who breaks a law, so why waste our resources? Especially now. I would like a system in place that did a better job of keeping track of who was here and where they came from as well doing a better job of securing the border.
Syn:
What evidence do you have that they are not? We have had an open border policy for virtually all of our history, now all of a sudden I am supposed to believe all those landscapers are really mass murderers.
According to the Boston Herald there are 590,000 criminal illegals in the United States right now, with that number increasing by 40,000 a year.
Guess not all of them are law abiding people who just want to work.
Worst serial killer in U.S. history? Angel Resendez – illegal.
“Fine retire let’s just make it a law to shoot a wetback everyday and be done with it. “â€
Left by Terrye on June 14th, 2006
I live in California. There are bazillions of illegals here from all over the world … Latin America, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, you name it. Most of the crimes involving illegals is caused because of the illegal status and their fear of calling the police. They have come from places where the police might just kill you. Seriously. They have grown up with an almost instinctive fear of the police. They are aware that they are here illegally. Most of the crime involves illegals preying on other illegals. The criminals know that the victims won’t go to the police and report the crime. What happens in response is that the various neighborhoods begin for form gangs as they band together for safety in numbers and look out for each other. Yes, there are also organized crime gangs too, but again, they mostly prey on other illegals because they know that the people in those communities are not likely to contact the authorities. Also, these people don’t trust or understand banks or the banks require a level of identification they don’t have to open an account. This results in them keeping their cash in their homes. Again, this makes them prime crime TARGETS. It has also spawned racial tensions in some areas. As illegals moved into areas previously populated by an urban black population, there have been turf wars. Also, the existing gangs realized the illegals wouldn’t go to the police to report crimes so they also prey on them. Again you have another incentive for Latin gang formation at first out of protection of their neighborhoods because they need someone to turn to in order to administer justice when they are victims of crime. They don’t feel safe going to the police and working in the justice system but they do feel safe reporting the trouble to a neighborhood gang which might result in street justice.
Converting them to a legal status will do more to eliminate crime than to encourage it.
CROSSP, if I understand your argument, it is that the illegals are committing crimes because they are illegal, therefore it is logical to assume if we just make them legal, they won’t commit any more crimes. Novel argument. Let’s see now.
This guy that killed the girl at Clemson, he wasn’t an illegal immigrant and he killed somebody, so let’s apply the logic here. I’m confused, he WASN’T illegal BUT he committed a crime. Not a good example, hmm, let’s see. That woman that killed her minister husband there in Tennessee, let’s see, was she illegal? hmmm, nope. Well, let’s get another good example. You’re gonna have to help me out here. All crimes are committed by illegals because they’re illegal, except for the crimes that AREN’T committed by illegals. Tell you what, instead of making the illegals legal and stopping all crime which MAY be successful, let’s just make all crimes legal then we will have 100% of the people will not be committing crimes. Sounds good to me.
Now that’s funny, I don’t care who you are.
“Larry the Cable Guy
AJ–
The people they are arresting are criminals, gang members, or people who have already been deported by sneaked back.
So I read.
Talking specifically about John McCain:
Mike Albon, Local 2544’s public information officer, told NewsMax, “All the comments on our Web site are the opinions of the Local and can be taken as the Union’s point of view.”
To say the least, the Senate bill’s gradual amnesty program for many who have crossed the border illegally is unpopular with Local 2544:
“We strongly oppose any attempts to reward illegal alien lawbreakers. We have risked our lives to keep them out of this country. The slick politicians can call it ‘guest-worker’ or ‘earned legalization’ all they want, but it’s amnesty.”
Excellent job AJ. I’ve been trying to make this very point but could not do it succinctly. Here you’ve done it in a few paragraphs. Thank you. I’m sending this one around.
I found this related snip on WhiteHouse.gov:
A Temporary Worker Program Is Vital To Securing The Border. Creating a separate, legal channel for those entering America to do an honest day’s work would dramatically reduce the number of people attempting to sneak across the border. That would help take pressure off the border and free up law enforcement to focus on the greatest threats to our security – terrorists, drug dealers, and other criminals. The program would also improve security by creating tamper-proof identification cards that would allow authorities to keep track of every legal temporary worker, while making it more difficult for illegal immigrants to evade the law.
SEE: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/04/20060424-4.html
Thanks also to Crosspatch for the enlightening info about crime within the illegal communities.
the senate bill has absolutely no chance of passing. the bill that comes out of the conference committee will have a fence with no felon status attached to it. the fence will be built first before anything else is enacted. why? because the deportation aspects of prior and future bills have no teeth without a leak proof fence. every gang banger that we send home is back in their apartment within a month. if you don’t believe me talk to the border patrol. now when illegals get caught sneaking in they get bused home and they just keep trying until they finally get in again. the dirty secret–they all get in eventually.
all the illegals that are here will be given 10 year green cards vs five year. they will treated as if they just got here–the end of the line.
there will be no back social security gifts, no fines, taxes what have you. if tomorrow we enforced the laws already on the books–via employers–this country would go into a depression. you cannot put 7-8 million out of work without a bone rattling recession. the social services net in this country would collapse. think katrina 100 fold. the other lunacy is the thought that these folks would go meekly. this is their country now and forty million hispanics are not going to stand by quietly as we wreck communities through unemployment.
we caused the problem by leaving our borders open and seducing these folks to come here. we have devastated mexico by hollowing it out. over 20% of its fittest are here contributing to the quality of our lives. you ate some of their labor for dinner. once we realize we are the problem, we will seal the border and put an end to this BS.
everyone will have to show a national ID card when applying for a job–and i mean you to. the main battles will be down the road as to whether or not these new citizens, ten years from now, will be allowed to bring in extended family. the barbara jordon commission 1990-95 said no.
just remember as we have been discussing the upholstery on the deck chairs for these last several weeks 190,000 more of our friends have come to say hello, permanently.
in the very near future this from 2000–it is more shaded now in 2006 (picture)
http://www.censusscope.org/us/map_hispanicpop.html
will lead to this because of their sheer numbers (picture)
http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/4786/105/1600/Aztlan.jpg
because we don’t have this (picture)
http://www.weneedafence.com/images/Fence_Idea.jpg
first things first…….
Terrye
AJ made the assertion and needs to back up his claim.
Further, if we really had “an open border policy virtually all our history” therefore all those legal immigrants who spent thousands of dollars, provided proof of employment/business, spent years (sometime decades) pushing paperwork should have all their monies returned and compensated for time lost from having to complete and pay for the mounts of paperwork required to live in America. Not only that, my Danish friend, her husband and their son (born on American soil) should be allowed to sue the American government and her people for having thrown them out of the country.
What about those immigrants from around the world who enter our country legally, at great expense and time to themselves only to be recieved by the idea that they really should have ignored our laws and entered illegally?
That said, which political party imposed quotas upon the number of immigrants allowed to enter the country and why? Wouldn’t have anything to do with Unions and their influence over political power would it?
For Enforcement,
I believe Crosspatch is pointing out the fact that the majority of illegal immigrants are at the mercy of gangs and criminals since being illegal prevents harmless illegal immigrants protection under the law.
Whatever immigration laws our political representatives legislate I hope they will actually enforce these laws otherwise what is the point to having laws at all.
What I hear from the illegal is legal open border argument is, metaphorically speaking, ‘well, the poor bank robber has already robbed the bank, has the money, did nothing wrong but robbed the bank so we should ignore the law, let the bank robber free because the bank robber is people too and it’s the humane thing to do”.
Please note my metaphor does not claim that illegal immigrants are bank robber, it is about how we (US citizens) regard our laws.
Ah yes Syn, I believe also that was the argument CrossP was attempting, but I don’t think it is a good argument. Think about several things that are alleged, that there are so many people here illegally there is no way we can find them all, etc. But, the Gangs can find all of them a rob them etc. Sometimes when persons are making an argument for their position, they overlook the obvious that the opponent will pick up on to use against them. I’m certainly one of those. As Rush Limbaugh likes to do, demonstrate absurdity by being even more absurd. That was my illustration, that since illegals are committing crimes against illegals and making them legal would stop that is no more logical than just doing away with the law making crimes illegal then NO ONE will be committing any crimes.
“If 90% of the immigrants are harmless”
I think the number is nearer 89% or maybe 88% Anyhow I like that part of the discussion. We can’t find any of these, so we offer Amnesty, the 90% then comes out of the woodwork. So now our problem is only one tenth as big as it was. Actually it is the same. There was 1.2 million(using your numbers) that we had to worry about, now there is still 1.2 million that we have to worry about. Of course these numbers are entirely pulled out of the air, nobody really knows how many illegals are here that we REALLY have to be worried about. Giving the Amnesty to the otheres will no more bring the unknowns out than any other method will. By the way, why couldn’t these 1.2 million CLAIM to be part of the good guys and get Amnesty. I guess if they unscrupulously did that, we wouldn’t have to worry about them any longer? Hmmm.
Folks,
I will say this for the umpteenth time: there is no sanity in serially putting in place the comprehensive measures. People who think we need to do the fence first are kidding themselves. The fence will take years and not be completed before Bush leaves office. And it will not stop people who say they are coming here for vacation or visiting friends and who stay on (which is why we need the comprehensive package). Anything enacted this summer doesn’t even begin until next year. Wake up. We are at risk from some fantasy of perfection. Stop letting fear and frustration drive this debate. Fear of guest workers (which we have and will have) cannot trump the threat of terrrorism.
SallyVee said:
“Excellent job AJ. I’ve been trying to make this very point but could not do it succinctly. Here you’ve done it in a few paragraphs. Thank you. I’m sending this one around.”
Well, I missed the point, I guess. That may not be unusual.
Let me see if I got it.
There were some illegal immigrants working at the Airport in a sensitive area.
They may or may not have been a threat
If ICE had posted a notice that “if any illegals are working here, let us know and we will give you amnesty”
All the illegals will come forward, get amnesty and continue working right there.
Problem is solved.
Whoops, the terrorist that was there came forward also, he had just kept his “terrorist diploma” hidden after he graduated from Al Quaeda’s basic training, where they taught him to do that I might add.
God that WAS simple. Let’s start posting the notices!
FE,
When you present simple minded ideas like that you don’t impact the points made by serious people, you simply illustrate why no one should take you seriously. Do you honestly think that is how it works????
Syn,
There are statistics galore that 10% of just about every human population tends the illegal and violent. There are statistics that show 10-20% of the immigrants have criminal records (real crimes).
The point is to illustrate the mathematics of the problem. Even if it was 50-50, the guest worker carrot reduces the scope of our challenge by half. It is the fact you cannot see this which makes your arguments irrelevant. The purity you think exists is a myth, and the reality of the threat you ignore is inescapable and dangerous.
And that is why Democrats will have an edge this fall. The all or nothing crowd will get its 20% and nothing.