Dec 26 2006
Will Bush Make Adjustments On Illegal Immigration?
Now that the Congressional Republicans have made themselves impotent on national issues by sacrificing progress to grasp onto politically unsustainable positions, the President is going to do what it takes to get major problems addressed. And while no solution is perfect, progress is a winning strategy over holding issues hostage. The big issue for the right is going to be immigration. The Fence Only crowd are now completely out of the political equation, so the question is whether Bush stands by his long term position on immigration reform, which held the broadest support in the country, or whether he will make adjustments.
Counting on the support of the new Democratic majority in Congress, Democratic lawmakers and their Republican allies are working on measures that could place millions of illegal immigrants on a more direct path to citizenship than would a bill that the Senate passed in the spring.
The lawmakers are considering abandoning a requirement in the Senate bill that would compel several million illegal immigrants to leave the United States before becoming eligible to apply for citizenship.
The lawmakers are also considering denying financing for 700 miles of fencing along the border with Mexico, a law championed by Republicans that passed with significant Democratic support.
Details of the bill, which would be introduced early next year, are being drafted. The lawmakers, who hope for bipartisan support, will almost certainly face pressure to compromise on the issues from some Republicans and conservative Democrats.
Still, the proposals reflect significant shifts since the November elections, as well as critical support from the Homeland Security Department.
First off, the Democrats will not want to repeat the disasterous mistake of the Republicans and not address the issue. If they try to play for time like the House Reps did they will rappidly lose any momentum they have (and they don’t have a lot given they are seen as the lesser of two evils right now). So Bush has the stronger hand. No one is going to force him into a position he disagrees with deeply. That means strengthening the borders will still be a key element of the final solution. But so will the Guest Worker program.
Say a thankful good-bye to the excessively punitive approach lauded by the far right. There are punishments in the Bush approach. People need to pay up all back taxes. That takes years to do and really constricts a family’s spending money. Then there will be the move to put immigrant jobs onto the open market under full employment and tax laws. That will further reduce the take home pay of those in those jobs as money goes from salary to taxes and benefits. The lesson of economics is a harsh one that cannot be avoided. So there will be a huge financial penalty in the guest worker program that will last for 3-5 years as people make amends for all those years working illegally. The need to ship them across the border for a day or two and force them to lose their homes, etc is not accomplishing anything. But it does make it undesirable to partake in the program. And we want people to go willingly into the program so we don’t have to spend law enforcement resources on this effort – which only takes away from anti-terrorism efforts.
In addition, the fact that immigrant workers will not be allowed to use any of their time here illegally to apply for citizenship is another well tuned penalty. I am not so worried about the immigrant who becomes a citizen 10-15 years from now as I am about the lack of security on the border and the enormous illegal population inside this country that can ccover up an Al Qaeda force of hundreds. Our national priorities do not include excessive punitive measures against migrant workers which have no effect on the wages of American workers (who are not field hands by nature) but do effect the prices we face and we can export.
I predict Bush gets his package pretty much as is and the Dems will claim they took out the punitive, right wing aspects of the program. And Bush will be the one who saves the border enhancements. And the right will not be grateful one bit, setting the stage for the 2008 repeat losses. And the general populace will see this all as a good thing.
“I haven’t really done any analysis about why the Repubs lost, but I believe it is most likely because not enough progress was being made in Iraq.”
You got that right, but it’s not because TRADITIONAL CONSERVATIVE Republicans like Ron Paul of Texas and Buchanan didn’t warn of the quagmire which awaited and the Israeli Lobby
pulling the key strings. So don’t complain if the hard left was
right on the war, along with the few conservatives not bought
out by “the Lobby.” And throw away the narrow angle lens, replacing it with the wide angle: a nation beset with serious internal problems
dares not believe it can, or should, conduct long term wars of choice on the opposite side of the globe.
TomAnon
“Amnesty and Guest Worker are not the same.” Anything less than enforcing the extant laws is amnesty,but denying it is the same as
…weakness.
For Enforcement, I think we are basically in agreement. We lost the congress because many “purists” would rather throw out the baby, than adjust the temperature of the bath water. Can’t have everything we want? Then let’s take our bat and ball and go home handing the left a victory by default which the msm is selling as a triumph for moonbattery.
IMO opinion we lost the congress because Republicans vacillated on issues, not because they were steadfast.
Everything I’ve learned about the issue of illegal aliens, undocumented workers, or whatever you want to call them, leads me to believe they are not the menace the media would like us to believe. They pay sales taxes and payroll taxes and most even file their income taxes. These folks come here to work and become Americans and I say welcome amigos.
Erp, I agree. When I said amnesty and guest worker were the same thing, I didn’t mean literally. I meant for enforcement purposes. The reason for guest worker program is to allow them to stay here with no penalty (equaling amnesty)
I would be happy to have a workable guest worker program, but we’re not going to.
In general, I agree with your last paragraph, I do believe most of the Mexicans in the US are no problem and comply with all the laws they are permitted to.(by that, I mean in some cases, complying with the law would cause them lots of problems, which they don’t need) I have no problems at all with peaceful immigrants assimilating and becoming citizens legally.
you said:”We lost the congress because many “purists†would rather throw out the baby, than adjust the temperature of the bath water. Can’t have everything we want? Then let’s take our bat and ball and go home handing the left a victory by default” I agree with this also, but interpreted it differently. I think the Repubs want the border laws enforced and they saw it as Pres Bush didn’t. By him endorsing the ‘comprehensive’ law, they saw that as capitulation to the dems on allowing no enforcement, amnesty and citizenship. Had the Repubs seen it as enforcing the laws, no amnesty and no free citizenship, it would have been greatly supported by them. They interpreted the fence bill as enforcement, so supported that as at least getting one thing they wanted.
I realize everyone has their own interpretation of events, this is just mine.
I don’t believe we will ever have an enforceable border policy.
For years “radicals” on talk radio have been warning that the international planners (Bildeburgers) were planning to do away with all borders and create a universal work place where workers would be able to go where their skills were most needed. Our whole education system was geared toward teaching tolerance, understanding, and multiculturism instead of instilling in our children the basic understanding of math, physics, historical knowledge of their own cultural heritage and communication skills. It was said that would prepare them to readily move around as world citicens instead of being tied to one specific country.
Apparently none of these pie in the sky world planners factored in human nature, which makes people go where opportunities look the brightest. The US, as the undisputed world icon of prosperity and freedom, has become a magnet for all underprivileged, underemployed and otherwise unfortunate citizens who want a better life. It has also become a magnet for criminals, vicious gangs, and unetical lowlife who prey on the most vulnerable segments of society.
Many of these new arrivals come from areas where community standards for clean water and sanitation are unheard of. As a result we are finding them living in over crowded houses with inadequate facilities and neighbors complaining of their unsanitary living habits which are destroying property values.
We now have groups of unskilled workers standing on street corners looking for Day Labor jobs, our hospitals are overloaded to the point of bankruptcy, our schools are overcrowed and inadequate, jails and prisons are overflowing with alein criminals, and we are now having frequent outbreaks of E-Coli and other third world type contaminations of our food supply. These are problems that we did not have before these tunnel visioned world planners began promoting their open borders policies.
It is said we can’t control our borders, yet for years we did just that. A few managed to get into the country illegally but we did not have this wholesale invasion that is going on today. If we cannot physically stop this invasion which threatens the future and prosperity of our country, then we must find a way to discourage people from coming here. The magnet of “good jobs” and “unlimited prosperity” must restricted so that they are not availabe to the future hordes of the world’s unfortunateswho come here illegally. When noncitizens take jobs for substandard wages with no fringe benefits, do not pay taxes or SS, yet line up for free schooling for their children, free madical care, and welfare benefits, they become a burden on society.
Our country is already bankrupct and the dollar is in trouble. OPEC, China and other countries with large dollar holdings are switching to the Euro and other courencies. Our foreign debt exceeds the assessed value of everything in the country. Cities and states are selling their infrastructure ( water depts., highways, etc) to foreign interests. Our manufacturing base is gone. Our national debt is out of sight. We have carried the world on our backs since WWII. Now our country is on the brink of insolvancy and we are still letting the world dump all it’s problems on us. Sure,it’s heartless and cruel to deny others access to the oppoprtunities we have, but where do we draw he line? If we don’t look after our own best interests, our Children will inherit a country beset with problems that more resembles the third world hell hole these immigrants are fleeing than the shinning city on the hill of today.
Most of these new arrivals come from areas where bribery. corruption and oppression of the weak are the rule of the day. They know of no other type of government. They will vote for whoever promises to give them the most from the public treasury. It has been said that our democracy will last only until the public realizes it can vote itself funds from the public treasury. We are setting the stage for our own destruction by accepting people whom we know will eventually out vote us on issues that will affect our own well being.
It has been projected that if the present trend continues, our population will reach 500 million by 2050. Most of this increase will from immigration. I remind you that China’s population was 500 million in 1953. Today it is 3 times that and growing.
Is this the legacy we want to leave to our children? Immigration can and must be controlled. It’s a bold faced lie that nothing can be done about it. If we can build jails to house criminal aliens, we can build jails to house people who aid and abet illegal immigrants. Jailing a few high profile businessmen who give them jobs, instead of slapping them on the wrist and fining them a few dollars would put an end to it in a hurry.
I am fed up with the lot of lily livered cowards, both Dem and Rep, who are afraid they are going to do somehting to hurt somebody’s feelings. Charity begins at home. If we don’t take care of our own , nobody else is going to.
Berp
“Can’t have everything we want? Then let’s take our bat and ball and go home handing the left a victory by default which the msm is selling as a triumph for moonbattery.”
You didn’t get everything you wanted in the Iraq War but aren’t you among the 20% who wish to increase the troops and hope Bush defies the 80% who do not, hoping for an all-out victory?
Momdear1
“Apparently none of these pie in the sky world planners factored in human nature, which makes people go where opportunities look the brightest.”
You’ve got much of it right but here you fall short..should read
“factored in ethnic group unity dynamics, which makes the Mexican
government openly sponsor an invasion retaking the Southwest from the gringo.”
If the President (Bush) signs the sellout of our country, granting citizenship to the many millions of illegals now, and many, many more in the future, he deserves to be impeached.
Because this huge mistake will be so huge, it will overshadow Iraq (a strategic blunder, because it made Iran the dominant regional power) and any other mistake in the past 100 years, which will imperil our survival as a nation.
We’ve seen what happens to a divided (by religion and ethnic fault lines) country-in Yugoslavia.
The same will happen here, in our beloved USA, if the amnesty happens.
And this even will be remembered as the day of American catastrophe throughout the ages..
Dbostan
You are so right and offer a rare insight to the myopic crew
dominant here.
AJ- good analysis
ERP- agree
SallyVee- agree
FE- agree that public perception of Iraq was the deciding factor in the election.
Real enforcement can only begin when we have:
• a fool-proof ID system,
• an accessable data base,
• a functional tracking system and
• incentives for self registering.
It is foolish to “break” the economy to “fix” the borders, when we can control the immigrants by matching them to jobs.
, ie. “guest workers.”
dbostan I don’t agree that the Pres signing a bill passed by Congress is an impeachable offense. Would the Congress people also be impeached?
The answer to any political person doing something you don’t agree with is to vote for someone else. In this case, who would you vote for?
All Dems would do even more damage. They are for immediate surrender. The Repubs want to put it off for a few years.
Yes, it would be a huge mistake that the country will never recover from, but it’s going to happen anyhow. There are too many people that want power now and to hell with the future of the US.
Yes, some laws were enforced many years ago, but when the Hispanic vote for power became more important that the security of the US, all that went out the window. And will never return. No one any longer has the political will to put America first(in the immigration issue).
Macker, so true:
“It is foolish to “break†the economy to “fix†the borders, when we can control the immigrants by matching them to jobs.
, ie. “guest workers.â€
And that’s exactly why the borders won’t be fixed. (because it would break the economy and hurt some politicians) I agree that an enforced guest worker program would solve the problem, but I don’t think we’ll ever get to find out because even if a law is passed concerning one, it will never be enforced. What is the evidence that anyone would be even slightly interested in enforcing any laws?
Should we say, why not give it a chance? Been there, done that.
FE,
True, but when Reagan “did that,” we didn’t have the technology to track everybody, nor the need, occasioned by terrorism.
FE says
“Yes, it would be a huge mistake that the country will never recover from, but it’s going to happen anyhow.”
Then why are you still hoping for “victory” in Iraq and spending energy denouncing war opponents of both left and right? A man divided with himself, in inner conflict, should work out those
conflicts before posting inwardly contradictory politics.
Only some sort of school choice can restore our public schools to their former excellence. This is our primary task because without an informed citizenry, the left still can wrest control of our country and destroy our economy and with it our way of life.
We on the right, who know that only free trade and individual freedom can lead to peace and prosperity, must put aside out small differences and work together to finally dislodge the old leftwing dinosaurs still sitting in congress decade after decade.
Ken, you said:”Then why are you still hoping for “victory†in Iraq and spending energy denouncing war opponents of both left and right?
Who said I was hoping for victory?
We won our part, now the Iraqi’s have to win their part, give them 6 months and they’ll have it under control.
I know you’ll be crushed, but hey, that’s the way it is.
erp,
Agree.
And the Left has already gained control of the big city schools. It has produced both a shift downward and to the left in the standards.
I wonder if breaking up the big school districts wouldn’t help? Just a thought.
I’m going to preface this rant with an apology for my tone, but I get so DAMNED MAD when people talk about this subject while glaring ignoring the technical impossibilities of it. I know that there are at least twelve million illegals in this country, (personally I think it’s more that double that.) And I agree that something needs to be done about it. Also, I have no problem with a real guest worker program, that is NOT a cover for blanket amnesty and erasing the border. But I think that is exactly what this sham bill is going to be. The main problem here is numbers. We cannot take in the many millions of poor people that will come here in just the next few years without financially devasting some areas of the united states and crime soaring.
Again, I can tell for sure that most of you are probably from the east coast and New England and have no idea what it is to deal with the illegal alien problem every single day. AJ, pay back taxes?? ON WHAT??? How can you have someone pay back taxes when you have no idea of how much money they made? Get a slight grip on reality here. Almost all of them claim married and ten dependents and don’t pay any income taxes. THEY LIKE IT THAT WAY!!!! And you know what, the IRS can’t dispute what they say because they are U N D O C U M E N T E D!!! AND THEY LIKE IT THAT WAY!! Have any of you New York fools figured out the implications of that phrase yet? You cannot document the undocumented without having to take all of the personal data they give you at face value and make it legal!!
SOMEBODY ANSWER THIS QUESTION! How is this program going to work? It will probably breakdown to a mexican going to an office, filling out a form, and coming to the US as a legal worker. All that crap about matching jobs to people. What do you think would happen if the US govt put out the word, OK Who wants cheap labor? Sign here! So every single employer in the country says, I DO! What now? This is where the extreme dishonesty of the whole guest worker program is exposed. And the unions, who think they’ll unionize these new workers are FOOLS! They don’t even want to pay taxes, they sure as hell are not going to pay union dues!
Again, leave the job program lie aside, how do you handle establishing a real legitamate ID and tax file for one of these people.
If I can walk into an immigration office and say my name is Raul Gomez and I made twelve thousand dollars last year and I support a wife and at least two kids in Mexico, please give me my EIC refundable credit of three to four thousand dollars for EVERY year that I happened to make the Maximum EIC income amount. Now after cleaning up five figures on that one, I’m going back into another immigration and start the whole process over again with a new name. I figure about ten times doing this, I could retire in Cabo. I have been state and federal trained and done taxes for hundreds of people folks, I am not making this up!
How the hell do you expect them to even accomplish just taking names and building the required data for these illegals to pay taxes and social security. They have been lying about their identy for years using various names and ssn’s and they don’t keep any of the records. It would be an imposing time consuming investigation to do ONE person like this, and you think our DMV government could EVER solve this massive identity mess in a million years, ain’t ever gonna happen people.
Pat Neid, You are one of the few here who sounds like you have a clue on this. You must be from the southwest.
Sally Vee, I was in Arizona over the weekend and talked to a lot of locals. Heres a dirty little secret for ya, J.D. Hayworth lost because the illegals in his district are voting illegally and becoming the deciding majority in the elections because of their massive numbers, and THEY were the ones who voted him out! He probably wasn’t the only one.
FE, one, this bill will definitely pass, two, it will not be meaningless, it will cause the largest wave of illegal immigration into this country that we have ever experienced. Every time we pass one of these laws, that is exactly what happens. Right now there are some fiftly million mexicans who are wanting to come now. They want to come here and have a free hand to live in this society unidentified and use that to break the law. They also want all of the perks and benefits of being a US citizen. You are dead right about the fact that this is another law that will not be enforced and no one intends to.
ERP, my nephew is eleven years old and goes to school in Tuscon AZ. He is the only non hispanic kid in his class and one of the few in the school. He has to fight his way through lunch every day because he is white and they hate his guts. Why? Because in their eyes, he does not belong there. Their parents have taught them that this is not america where they live, it’s Aztlan, (Mexico), and we are unwelcome invaders. They are displacing populations down here, not mixing. They are bent on taking back the southwest united states and I am becoming convinced that some in washington are willing to give it to them, probably in the hope that they will stay there mainly and not so much migrate to the east and northeast. This North American Union stuff is starting to look more and more like reality instead of moonbat stuff.
Momdear1, YOU JUST FREAKIN ROCK!!!!
You too Macker, you’re short post said it all and said it well!
Momdear1 ,Bikerken, Macker
Finally the face of reason on this illegal immigration problem, I really appreciate your succinct and logical arguments. I live in Missouri, it is not the Southwest, but I can still see and feel the repercussions of what our Republican and Democrat politicians are doing to us. We are being squeezed in two ways. Mexicans are coming here to take away the middle class jobs (forget that baloney about them only being farm laborers) and Big Business is sending good manufacturing jobs to Mexico. I know. My job is headed to Monterrey, Mexico on February 28, 2007. It “is” or rather “was” a lower management manufacturing job, I made a comfortable living. I didn’t have a lot of frills, because I never really aspired to the “he who dies with the most toys” life style. But it is now a job that my grandchildren or your grandchildren will not have a chance to occupy. Everyone is not blessed with the skill sets and opportunities to be at the top of the heap. We seem to headed in the direction of a “haves and have nots” society.
You’re right that immigration has divided even the immigrants. If the schools were properly run, there could be no fights inside the building. Instead of kids being taught they’re oppressed, they would be taught civics and how to become Americans.
Many years ago before PC, I went to school in NYC where there kids of every conceivable color and race. There may have been fights outside, but in school peace reigned. We were taught we were one race, American. Eventually it sunk in.
Will it be easy? No. If we allow lefties to continue to control our schools, it’ll be disaster. Leftwing politics! Encouraging people to believe that by fighting and marching, they’ll be given part of our southwest is totally ludicrous.
I’ve traveled extensively in Mexico and can tell you that even though the land south of the border is no different from north of the border, the people made one side into green fields and prosperous cities while the south remains mile after miles of moonscapes with pathetic women selling caged birds at the side of the highway.
Nobody gave us prosperity. We worked for it.
Mexico is so riddled with corruption now that maybe the people can’t do what we did, so let those who want to be Americans come join us. The agitators should be sent back and not allowed back in.