Sep 01 2007
Newt’s Nonsense On Immigration
We all remember that the GOP torpedoed immigration reform, claiming the status quo was preferrable to strengthening our laws and making it easier to deport violent criminal immigrants. The crazy GOP claimed all we had to do was “enforce the laws” on the books now. I have shown many times why this is all a lie. A lie to voters and to GOP supporters. Newt Gingrich shows us once more why the GOP is as brain dead and misleading as the Democrats:
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said Tuesday he is “sickened” that President Bush and Congress went on vacation “while young Americans in our cities are massacred” by illegal immigrants.
Newt is either lying or going senile. Bush tried and tried and tried to fix the immigration laws with a broadly supported set of reforms. But it was the GOP, Newt’s GOP, that torpedoed the changes. And I said it then and I will say it now: all the damage, harm and death committed by immigrants who could have been deported expiditiously under the new policies of the bill stopped by the GOP is the fault of the GOP – no one else. I knew they would try and do things like this, blame Bush for their actions (so typical of pols these days). But they cannot escape reality. The GOP let the currently broken system survive, so they are to blame for everything that sickens Newt:
Gingrich, who is considering a run for the White House, was referring to a recent crime in Newark, N.J., where three college students were murdered execution style in a school playground.
One of the suspects — Jose Lachira Carranza — is an illegal immigrant from Peru who was on bail on charges of raping a child when the murders occurred.
Gingrich said another suspect is an illegal immigrant from Nicaragua with a long record of arrests who was ordered deported in 1993 but never left.
All those who opposed El Presidente Jorge Bush are the ones who left these animals to roam free in our midst. I doubt they will ever acknowledge, let alone take resonsibility, for their mistakes and paranoia. But that is irrelevant. They lied to us and this is what we can look forward to for the next 3-5 years, which is who long it will be before we get another serious shot at immigration reform.
And besides all that if all the socalled hardliners are interested in is law enforcement, why the need to make racist comments about hispanics?
I read them on blogs, heard them on talk shows and there was nary a word of protest from the right.
And why call the bill an abomination and the people who supported it traitors? That was not necessary, all it did was create anger and resentment. I am not saying you have to support the bill, but saying that it is treason for someone else to was all to common on the right. Along with all kinds of outrageous and untruthful claims about the bill and its supporters.
Those are the kind of tactics I would expect from the Kos crew.
I have my problems with McCain, but that man spent 7 years in a POW camp in Viet Nam and some of the stuff I was hearing about him from the sanctimonious preachers on the right was just plain wrong.
So it might help in the future if the people who are dead set against any kind of immigration reform might just stop and consider the fact that the people who disagree with them on this issue have a right to their opinion.
And that they should be able to voice that opinion without their patriotism being questioned.
having the punishment fit the crime is not amnesty. It always shocks me how conservatives use Clintonian tactics to argue with those who suggest a pragmatic and realistic approach to a problem. In an ideal world, there would be no illegals, all employees hiring them would be fined and illegals would be deported. The combination of sheer numbers, economic reality, inability to totally shut the border (if even desirable) and the preservation of due process ( which should be a key concept even for a strict constitutionalist) make this ideal world unatainable. Then what. We have Newt, DC’s and the general conservative’s answer, do nothing, or we can face reality and try to separate the good from the bad and attempt to integrate better (ie no ESL funding). One approach attempts to solve a problem while the other gets egotistical has-been politicians some air time. And we wonder why young people are tuned out of politics or are cynical toward conservatives. Self fulfilling prophesy.
I’m not a conservative…nor a republican. I’m a registered democrat. You, along with the rest of your strawman arguments, have totally misjudged this issue. That’s WHY you got your ass handed to you…twice. Want to try for three???
Dc:
I am not a Republican either and I never got my ass handed to me and your obnoxious attitude is so common among hardliners that it cost them seats in 2006.
I voted for Hostettler in that election, he was a hardliner and he got his handed to him.
So I think you are wrong as to who is losing and who is winning here. If the status quo is winning why make asses of yourselves in the first place? Do you really think that is was necessary to call McCain McSwine to get some more ICE agents? Do you think that the comments about hispanics all being diseased criminals blah blah blah was going to do anything but alienate a voting bloc? No if that is winning the argument Dc then I think I will stick with losing. Because if that helps the liberals pick up seats in the next election then the right on this issue is going to be looking pretty wrong.
As far as misjudging the issue, there are millions of undocumented workers in this country, the socalled winners in this debate have never come up with an answer as to what to do with them. they just bitch about the fact that they are here.
I think that any efforts made to secure the border can only help, I am not opposed to additional people on the border or a fence or anything like that. I just think that people like yourself are living in a fantasy if you think that raiding some meat packing plants and building a fence will be enough to solve the problem.
Actually I live not too far from Washington Indiana where there is a plant like that. There are not enough locals who want to do the work, so people come in. Just like they have been coming for decades to pick the melons the locals do not want to pick. I think that eventually most of these places in the US will close and we will be importing more of our food.
They can’t hear you Terrye. It’s as if they can not see the complete picture but only a tiny sliver. I watched a company grow to mega size and almost an entire town change as a result of Mexican labor. Was it right? No and for about thirty years I could have told you many things that needed to be done to halfway correct what was coming.
The problem they refuse to address is that they still think there is ‘someone’ to do these jobs at the right price. There is not. You identified an area that will be wiped out if the hardliners get their way. FOOD. This is my nightmare. I seldom even mention it because it scares the crap out of me. We already have major problems with not being able to control our FOOD. I can only imagine the Feds nightmares. If we hear yip-yap now over the deported jobs (which I hate), just wait until we get ALL our FOOD from foreign ports instead of Mexican labor.
It is not just landscapers or roofers. At some point, the previous two occupations would be filled by Americans. That does nothing to address the ones that would not.
I live in NYC.
The larger worry for our food and drug supply is China, who supplies bulk ingredients and preservatives, etc., used in a large portion of certain kinds of food products, vitamins, etc. There have already been deaths linked to screwups with that. And because of the complete pervasiveness of their influence, one screwup, can impact almost the entire sector. (as happened with the pet food/wheat glutin issue).
But, lets do talk about “not seeing” things. Illegal immigrant labor has absolutely destroyed U.S. labor unions. Unions that common folk depended upon for a living wage and safety at the work place. And the entire reason they do the job so cheap, is because they are shortcutting everything that others have to abide (like inspections, equipment and personel safety regulation requirements, etc. and protocals, etc.) No doubt, that chicken plant we are speaking of, probably has run others out of business lowballing prices, protocals, etc.
That is “part” of the equation of “doing the jobs nobody wants to do”. There’s a reason nobody wants to do certain jobs (like crawling through a hole or climbing a precarious tower without safety gear). It’s because it’s dangerous and it kills people. Screw the price. Those safe regs are in place for a reason. It costs money to abide them. Companies that “do” follow them and create a safe working environment for their workers, are at a distinct disadvantage to companies run by and or staffed by illegals who could give a chit what the rules or regs are.
I would add, there are “plenty” of “legal” immigrants here, Mexicans included, who are willing and able to work..who are just as capable of working as an “illegal” mexican. It’s true, that businesses who have now built their profit margins upon near slave labor, are going to take a hit and have to change things in order to run their businesses legally. That’s true of any illegal enterprise..is it not? We ARE going to have to start over in some ways…doing things in a different way. The people who are on the law breaking end of this…are no different. They are going to be impacted to.
There will not be another …start over from here…bill for immigration. ..ie..we’ve let the problem get so out of hand..we can’t possible solve it…so lets just accept it from here..and move foward with new laws that take into account where we are. Ain’t gonna happen.
Dc:
The larger worry is that those meat packers and produce growers will just go across the border where the labor is, needless to say that would wreck the economies of those states dependent on the taxes paid by those producers, but who cares. Why not just create a guest worker program for them?
As for labor unions, that is ridiculous. Are you going to tell me that the whole reason the AFL-CIO is on the ropes is the Mexicans? What about the teamsters? They priced themselves right out of the market. It could not have anything to do with the mob, or with pricing themselves out of work could it? I have to tell you the days of making $23 an hour to turn a screw are over.
Here in Indiana, the coals mines who do not use union labor are paying as much as the ones who do and there are no illegals in that business.
And one of the reasons the Bracero program we had with Mexico for decades was killed was because the unions wanted it killed. But they did not do the work, they did not replace the labor, so the migrants kept coming.
The unions have no one but themselves and progress to blame for the place they are in.
And not all these people are doing this work so cheap either. In agriculture the pay may not be high for picking peaches, but the brick layers and dry wallers don’t work for nothing.
Now if the unions want to go to New Orleans and clean up that mess they can, but so far they have not exactly been falling all over themselves for the opportunity.
There is no reason why people have to argue about this or call people names or make the kind of comments Newt made. It should be possible to deal with this without all that.
The truth is a recession would probably do more to slow down the people coming up here than anything the government could do.
Our unemployment rate is under 5%, unions do better with higher rates than that. Right now, the labor market is tight.
Oh Come on now…Just what jobs are all those Americans who lost their good paying factory jobs when our manufacturing base was outsourced to China doing? There are thousands of non working former textile employees and other semi skilled ex factory workers who no longer are looking for jobs. The factories that are hiring illegals are doing it because they dont’ want to offer American workers decent wages and pay all those mandated expenses that go with legal employees . It’s called greed. Some factory owners have been prosecuted for sending recruiters to Mexico to recruit and transport illegals to work for them. I know for a fact that a local factory in our area fired all it’s American workers and replaced them with Mexicans. I knew people who worked there. I am sure it is not the only one. After all, they claim they have to stay competitive or move to China.
Does anyone think that people who were earning $20 and $30 per hour would take minimum wage jobs with no benefits cleaning tioilets in motels and bussing tables? Of course they wouldn’t. In our Welfare state, where everyone is entitled to whatever he wants except a monthly welfare check, most of them found a way . Hospital workers report that about 3 out of 4 adult patients are now on Social Security Disability and are covered under Medicare. People had to survive. What did anyone expect they would do. They found a govt. program , a sympathetic doctor to certify they were disabled, and got on it. And most of them are getting more per month than these under the table illegals are being paid.
Who was it said, “For every action there is a reaction?”
As for the ” hoaxed up” Illegal crime statistics. It was recently reported that illegal aliens are involved in one fourth of all traffic fatalities in this country, and most of them were DUI. And I am sorry if you think that the crime problem is being over reported, but the way I see it, if just one illegal alien robs, rapes, assaults, molests, or murders and American citizen, that is one illegal alien too many.
Oy, I agree with you in so many areas AJ, but this attitude that those of us who are opposed to the proposed “comprehensive immigration” bill are just a bunch of right wing nuts, drives me nuts.
I live in NE Pa., I’m the granddaughter of an immigrant……a legal immigrant from South Wales who came here to work in the coal mines. NE Pa. is a big melting pot, but they have no sympathy or empathy for the illegals because many of them had to “sweat out” waiting to be allowed to enter our country. Many of them were trying to get out of Eastern bloc countries or those that were part of the old Soviet Union. BTW, these folks are more than willing to do the hard, dirty jobs that many say Americans won’t do!!
I really don’t think you (and Terrye) have any idea how strong the sentiment is against the ILLEGAL immigrants. I have a very large extended family whose political bent seems to be evenly split between the 2 major political parties and to a man & woman, both Dem & GOP they are adamantly opposed to the comprehensive plan as it was proposed. With the recent dustup in June I started taking my own straw poll to see if my family/friends/extended family were just an aberration or a bunch of dolts somehow missing out on seeing “the big picture”.
Believe it or not, many of us do believe that our immigration laws need to be upgraded & streamlined using modern technology wherever possible. There is a big BUT coming…..and it pains me to admit it…..but when it comes to this issue I no longer trust or believe my government!! All that many of us have asked is that we seal the border, start weeding out the worst/criminal element and have the Feds show a little “good faith” that they will start to enforce existing laws.
This is not a Democrat or Republican issue; citizens of both parties don’t want amnesty shoved down our throats. Since June there have been attempts to “slip” thru portions of the amnesty bill by attaching it to other bills.
Folks in the Beltway need to know “it ain’t gonna work”!! We’ve got our eyes on them.
As DC so aptly put it; if Congress tries to slide this past us again without sealing the border they WILL get their asses handed to them.
Poodlemom,
I have no sympathies for these people – it comes down to cold hard logic. Something the far right is incapable of on this issue. We do not have the resources to go after these people AND protect this nation from terrorists. That is a fact and don’t even pretend it is otherwise. Second, the comprehensive bill provided for a real quest worker program with a mandatory exit. And convicted criminals were given the boot.
The real proof is in the results. We have nothing, and that is all thanks to the immigration hypochondriacs who stopped the bills. Words mean nothing when actions tell the true story.
Those criminals are on our streets because of the far right.
AJ,
The bill as presented was deeply flawed, but you are still ignoring the primary reason why folks like me are so adamantly opposed….as I said, it pains me, but I do not trust my government when it comes to this issue. All too many people do not trust our government on this issue.
Going back to the mid 60’s, 1985 we were promised immigration reform….and the government didn’t do a damn thing about the illegals. Why should we believe them now?
As I said before, I’m not against immigration reform, but unless and until the government shows willingness to enforce existing laws I have no confidence they would enforce them now. It’s really as simple as that. If I could see significant action by the government I would definitely be amenable to the startup of certain aspects of the bill. As it is today, the government is pulling agents from the border to use them to provide security to the
many political candidates!! That didn’t take long.
You keep ignoring the obvious, this is not a belief just of the “extreme right wing”. You are really kidding yourself if you believe that. I live in a VERY Democratic area of NE Pa actually the entire state is strongly Democratic, but the NE is a stronghold. When this issue was percolating in June all I heard was anti illegal sentiment. Folks here do not relate to illegals wanting to come here for better jobs to better their families, when many of them had relatives who lost their lives waiting to come to this country legally. We have Poles, Slavs, Serbs etc., many of them are willing to work in housekeeping at local motels, convalescent homes etc. They are more than willing to do the dirty jobs. They do not feel honest work is beneath them and it’s amazing how well they handle English.
I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree on this topic. I enjoy many of the topics you bring to your site, but on this subject your dismissive sarcasm has been difficult to read.