From Breitbart / AP:
The Senate voted to build 370 miles of triple-layered fencing along the Mexican border Wednesday and clashed over citizenship for millions of men and women who live in the United States illegally.
Amid increasingly emotional debate over election-year immigration legislation, senators voted 83-16 to add fencing and 500 miles of vehicle barriers along the southern border. It marked the first significant victory in two days for conservatives seeking to place their stamp on the contentious measure.
The prospects were less favorable for their attempt to strip out portions of the legislation that could allow citizenship for millions of illegal immigrants and create new guest worker programs.
The Senate acted in a volatile political environment, as the White House struggled for a second day to ease the concerns of House Republicans who contend that President Bush favors amnesty for illegal immigrants.
Thousands of demonstrators massed a few blocks from the Capitol demanding immigrant rights.
Construction of the barrier would send “a signal that open-border days are over. … Good fences make good neighbors, fences don’t make bad neighbors,†said Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. He said border areas where barriers already exist have experienced economic improvement and reduced crime.
”What we have here has become a symbol for the right wing in American politics,” countered Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill. He said if the proposal passed, “our relationship with Mexico would come down to a barrier between our two countries.”
Uh huh. A symbol for “the right wing” that received overwhelming bi-partisan support. Dick.
Could it be that racist nativists with a neverending need for a brown enemy exist in both parties?
Naw.
More likely, the Democrats who voted for the measure did so for all the the right reasons; or maybe they were bullied into it by “conservative” pressure—very much like their overwhelming support for authorizing the use of force in Iraq was simply a matter of their having been builied by crafty, bloodthirsty Republicans who lied—LIED!—to them.
I’m sure Glenn Greenwald will let us know soon enough.
****
See also: Sullivan’s passive conspiracy a-go-go!
(h/t Allah)
The Democratic Party – We Don’t Know Any Better.
Sullivan would make the perfect Star Jones replacement on “The View.”
I like how the Mexican government says they are going to file lawsuits against us if the National Guard troops actually, you know, enforce the border or something.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060517/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/mexico_us_immigration_8
Hey Vince, howsabout fixing your steenking economy so people aren’t risking death to clean toilets over here first, eh?
Those lawsuits won’t be cheap ya know.
On the subject of the lawsuits, how exactly is the Mexican government going to have standing to file lawsuits in US courts?
I am most troubled by what I have read about the clauses that will allow the current-illegals, once made citizens, to bring into the US their families from back home. Some numbers touted this would add up to a possible 190+ million new residents in the next 20 years. The U.S. only has about 300 million people total right now.
Okay, that is just a number when someone says it but try to wrap your head around the consequences of that many people trying to find housing. What that many new people will do will cause the greatest boost to urban sprawl this country will have ever seen. Housing for 190+million new people doesn’t exist now and will have to be built.
If the portions of the immigration reform include the ability to bring in their whole family from back home… start buying up land because land value will go through the roof as a builders and developers buy land try to meet the demand.
If you have leftie friends who say any immigrant who wants to come in should be let in, ask them what their stance on urban sprawl is and how they can reconcile the two views.
This immigration reform bill will be an urban planning nightmare of the worst proportions.
The only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time.
TR: Wall, man. Freaking WAALL
Sully’s piece is almost verbatim “Mona” from the discussion the other evening. She thinks that the BushBots are sooooo fed up with the Admin’s “incompetence” of “everything” that they have done that the illegal alien issue is just an excuse to get off the train.
Of course for that to be so, you would have to accept her premise that the Administration is so “incompetent” and every evil KKKultist is so disgusted with said incompetence.
True the issue has been around for years…many years..sort of like a festering boil that has finally come to a head and must be dealt with. I guess all of us that have been screaming about the porous border starting on 9/12/2001 were just waiting for an excuse to abandon ship.
What tripe!
rls,
Yeah, I love how everyone says that this is a “wag the dog” move. Not like there were any protests CONSISTING OF MILLIONS OF PEOPLE/ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS a couple of weeks ago or anything.
Nope, move along, nothing to see here.
Oh well, I guess there’s a first time for everything.
Sorry guys, I never thought I’d ever be able to say this, but I agree with Dick Durbin. Before you get all mad, read what he said again.
I was born and raised in Louisiana. I know populist demogoguery when I see it, trust me. “Racist nativist”? Perhaps not. But nativist racialism? Um, yeah.
I certainly don’t agree with Greewald et. al., but at the same time the right is bringing a lot of this on themselves. Sorry.
yours/
peter.
Yeah, Peter, you can even see it over at AOS. It’s disturbing but we should still try for immigration reform.
Of course the right is. This is a very contentious issue that has about as many “proposed” solutions as a porcupine has quills. So naturally there is going to be disagreement over any solution proposed. Some will say that it goes too far others will say that it doesn’t go far enough and some will say that it is the solution.
One thing I think everyone can agree on is that illegal aliens in this country is a problem that needs to be dealt with. How we go about doing that is the “bone of contention”. And, yeah, some people are totally irrational about it…and some are bigoted, yet many rightfully just want someone to address the situation in a responsible way.
But Dick Durbin is being disingenous. Any one that doesn’t think that an open border with Mexico after 9/11 is a security problem just doesn’t get it.
Peter,
Has the poison of identity politics made it necessary for me to like everything and everyone in order not to be a nativist racialist? Or a rativist nacialist, for that matter?
TW: Corps, like esprit d’morgue.
LaShawn was also leading the “impeach Bush” charge that pro-immigration forms like me and Lorie Byrd at PoliPundit referred to as both counterproductive and asinine.
It is the trick of Greenwald, et al., to make LaShawn the face of the immigration reform movement on the right. But the right, as you must have noticed from the comments here, holds a variety of nuanced views on immigration reform—particularly on the idea of what should happen with illegals already inside the country.
LaShawn Barber very very rarely ever speaks for me. She is a born again Christian and a hard-core social con. I think it is a fiction that such people make up the “conservative base”; instead, the conservative base is a loose alliance who are most cohered around judicial conservatism and smaller government. Social cons, by-in-large, wouldn’t mind government intrusion into a number of social issues.
1 : to grind or mix thoroughly : PULVERIZE
SB: talk
Cheaper than fixing the economy – both in the short and long term. Besides, ever notice how many of the immigrants aren’t quite as, um, well, European-in-appearance as those in power?
For the record, I’m not “leading” anything. In fact, I know when I’m defeated. Someone once said, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. I’m going to become an elite to insulate myself from the negative societal effects of the continued influx of wage-depressing, non-assimilating illegal aliens.
I doubt that’s “nuanced” enough, but there you go…
Ok, you’ve had enough, pal…
SB: section
the preparation exhibited a humor response
Could someone explain the bit of Instapundit snark at the end of the Andrew Sullivan post/link? Yes, yes, I live in the sticks, I’m a rube, I agree… but I don’t understand the line. In lieu of any meaningful explanantion, I’m going with it sure seems like AS has a real hard-on for Reynolds.
Unrequited luv isn’t pretty.
“Has the poison of identity politics made it necessary for me to like everything and everyone in order not to be a nativist racialist? Or a rativist nacialist, for that matter?”
Seconded.
I don’t like criminals demanding things to which they have no right. Sue me.
What Peter Jackson said.
La Shawn —
If I gave you too much credit vis-a-vis the articles of impeachment against Bush, I apologize. I had heard it was you who’d actually drawn up the articles and was leading the charge.
As I said at the time, I believe the idea diminishes the seriousness of impeachment. And I think that, politically-speaking, more harm will be done to the immigration reform movement by those who push for wholesale deportations, etc., because the media will use emotionally-charged stories of families being torn apart (children forced to chose whether to stay with their parents or move to a place that isn’t their home and never has been) to crush the movement.
This has not much to do with nuance and everything to do with political pragmatism. I am in support of the wall; I’m not in support of NG on the border (I’d rather hire and train more border patrol). But that’s just me trying to think this through in the long run.
Sorry if I offended you. I have no idea, incidentally, if you are a nativist or not. But I do hate to see charges like that thrown around casually, so if you disagree with Peter, by all means, let him know about it.
I am most troubled by what I have read about the clauses that will allow the current-illegals, once made citizens, to bring into the US their families from back home. Some numbers touted this would add up to a possible 190+ million new residents in the next 20 years. The U.S. only has about 300 million people total right now.
Oh, Good God, man, get a grip. There are only 106 million people in all of Mexico. They’re not letting many through from further south, and the rest of the world isn’t exactly going to be able to swim the Rio Grande to get in here. That 190 million number is meant to manipulate you.
Jeff, I think, offers a valuable, ambulant lesson in the heterogeneity of the right on this subject; there are others. I’m afraid, however, that his tribe exhibits increasing signs of failure to thrive. The prevailing winds are with others.
That said, two belated comments on the idea that the current increase in concern about illegal immigration is governed solely or largely by an austere regard for legality:
1. The whole force of restrictionist rhetoric belies it. The rule-of-law argument is most often adduced as a way of denying that particularist concerns are at work. Outside of that context, other reasons predominate: security, economic concerns, ethnic composition of the country, assimilation & assimilability, crime, budgetary effects, educational attainment or ability, etc. These are matters of the fitness of particular people for membership in the political community, not questions of legality. The (purported) harms are most often associated not just with illegal immigrants, but with immigrants per se, and, in nontrivial cases, with whole groups, immigrant or native-born. Who believes that restrictionists as a group would support a law affording future migrants free movement or citizenship (do what you will with those who’ve already broken existing law)?
2. The anxiety about legality, however acutely felt, is oddly selective. People routinely distinguish between legality, legitimacy, & good public policy. Dead-letter laws are regularly violated without widespread public disapprobation. Martial sodomy still is illegal in many states, but people who express the anxiety about it that’s exhibited by immigration restrictionists are thought odd. When was miscegenation finally removed from the criminal codes? Try to imagine the invective that daily pours from talk radio being directed against people who drive faster than the speed limit. The examples vary, but in each case when we are confronted with widespread practices that violate law, we discriminate cases: sometimes decide the law is wrong, sometimes that the offense is morally trivial, etc. Not all scofflaws are equal.
Judgments change with time, & politics consists in part of efforts to engineer such changes. Changes in criminal sanctions typically are accompanied by changing judgments of the moral & social significance of violations of existing law. We’re now witnessing attempts to stigmatize the hiring of illegals more heavily than it previously has been, & the effort to make illegals felons is accompanied by the same kind of thing.
The former illegality of homosexual sodomy was often pointed to as an austere justification of invidious treatment of homosexuals. The views now expressed about illegal immigrants were heard then about homosexuals. By breaking one law, the exhibited a propensity to break others. They are criminals; what part of “illegal†do you not understand, etc.
It’s been noted that the current upsurge may claim unintended victims, out-of-status Irishman; the fact that this is deemed ironic suggests that legality per se isn’t the whole story.
I wonder whether, if Mexico were populated by replicas of the WASP citizens of Kansas, legal restrictions against free movement would be upheld with the same anxiety we see today. Might there even be movement toward political union? The anger on display involves much more than abstract interest the rule of law. It involves judgments of fitness for membership in the political community, which reflect propensities with deep roots in human psychology. It is, dare I say, a form of identity politics.
It’s tempting to make that assertion, but it’s difficult to prove. Back in the day, the Irish and Italians were disparaged, as were Catholics, Mormons, etc. People find more reasons than skin color to identify the Other. I would say that cultural differences trump physical appearance any day of the week and thrice on Thursdays.
Even so, imagine that it was Canadians flooding across the northern border instead of Mexicans. If they were taking the cheap jobs (driving wages down), passing forged documents (and forged social security numbers), living on Welfare without paying into the system, closing down hospital emergency departments because they’re uninsured, crowding classrooms without paying into the system, wrecking cars without insurance, bringing gangs in, filling the jails, and living off the radar so that they can’t be properly kept track of, I think people would still consider illegal Canadians to be a problem, despite the fact that they were practically identical culturally and linguistically (except for oot and aboot).
Some people might be using “illegality” as a cover for bigotry, but for some of us, it’s the burden of having millions of people use the system without paying into it. It’s the math, eh?
Holy shit KH. It would have taken me a dozen posts to identify and articulate what you thoroughly nailed in a few succinct paragraphs.
And yes, it most absolutely is a form of identity politics.
Thank you.
yours/
peter.
Holy shit, KH. It would’ve taken me a dozen posts to write the same relativistic goobledygook that you thoroughly nailed in a few succinct paragraphs.
And no, it most absolutely is not just another form of identity politics.
No thanks.
Me, I think that the wall is a horrible, horrible mistake. Why come down hard on folks breaking the law from over the border before we take even the most rudimentary measures to enforce the people employing them here?
Start the law enforcement at home.
Chrust, two thousand fucking miles of fence. Ten million feet. That much crappy fence would cost you a hundred million, installed, in the city. I’m thinking this is going to be over a billion, easy, never mind the six thousand guard to patrol. Make it tall chainlink, and they’re just going to take the bolt cutters to it, dig under it, climb over it.
Fucking waste.
Yes. Build a wall. We have the right and the duty to secure our borders and we have neglected both.
Yes. There are eleven million immigrants already here. We must devise a mechanism to absorb them. The alternative is an exercise that would make the Trail of Tears look like a supermodel 1k walk/run for charity in terms of human dislocation. But if they’re going to live here, LIVE here. No multi-language gummint forms, English-immersion education only in schools, etc.
Can we do this? A question: what percentage of current Chinese-Americans are descended from illegal immigrants? What percentage of Irish-Americans? What percentage of the people posting on this board?
The fact is, we’ve done it in the past. We can, as needed, do it again.
Shorter JDM:
KH use big words. Me not understand. Wife, bring me beer!
(shorter KH)
RACIST!
T/W- Then again, I’m used to the methods used by asshats who wish to feel superior…
commenter,
KH is still full of shit, no matter how big his
dickwords are. He’s making false analogies, and bloated grandiloquent ones at that. Do you think anyone who differentiates between legal and illegal is a bigot, little different from a Klansman? Is any immigrant who followed the rules, and waited an eternity to get his (real) green card, a chump? Do you think US immigration laws are “dead-letter”?That much crappy fence would cost you a hundred million, installed, in the city. I’m thinking this is going to be over a billion, easy, never mind the six thousand guard to patrol.
That is less than the cost of the ‘free’ care provided to illegals in one year by the ER’s in California…
T/W: Now that the discussion of ‘cost’ is open, let’s talk about the $13,000.00 the Columbus(OH) Public Schools will spend every year on each and every (estimated 2000-2500 of 60,000)’children of illegals’… and the further costs of the 54% of them that will not ever graduate from HS(even worse, here in Cowlumbus, ‘graduation’ essentially means a ‘9th grade education’
.– but they’ll still be here for the next fifty years!
To Repeat the T/W– Open up your wallet, you got a welfare state adding 100 million clients!
– Erm Jeff, theres been some “adjustments” in the PoliPundit stable. Apparently the Eds couldn’t handle free speech and alternate views as well as they thought.
She’s no longer there, BBH?
Weird. The post I’m referencing wasn’t made too long ago.
Well, if she needs a place to hang her hat, she’s welcome to post here anytime.
Scenario: Lets say one fine night Mr. al Qaeda slips a cell of one of its teams up through the border, along with the estimated 7-10 thousand coming across daily, in the Mexican pipeline.
– The unthinkable happens, and they manage to perform a criminal/murdering terrorist act that eclipes 9/11 by a lot. say 50,000 dead with 5 times that many injured in some major metropolitan center at the height of rush hour, or the same through some sort of wide spread sabotage of some sort. Think of it as Katrina times 50.
– With that back drop, something that most security people say is not an “if†but a “whenâ€Â, reconsider the actions of our Congress and our administration, Bush at its head.
– Now how do you see things.
– When Bush insisted that all of the issues HAD to be tied to border control last night, I just got up and walked out of the room to calm down.
– Billions for homeland defense, but Washington actually argues seemingly smooth logical reasons to explain why we have no right to secure our own borders. Its Lunacy. Pure unadulterated Lunacy.
– For some reason, I’m not thinking about “voting issues†right now, or who is going to jump ship, or who is supporting who, yada yada yada, all the usual infantile nattering that goes on and swirls around any maximally important issue.
– We have done everything asked of us as a people in the WOT. Followed our Leader right down the line. Met the enemy “There” instead of “here”
– Almost 1 trillion spent.
– 2400? military dead.
– 15,000+ wounded.
– Two countries reformed in a fashion
– All of it, for all the good and right reasons.
– Now we’re told that defense of our own borders is somehow such a complex issue, and must be joined at the hip with immigration issues that could rage on for years, and that for all sorts of “good reasons” we can fight a war half a world away, but we dare not secure our own homeland.
– As an electorate folks we’re being “handledâ€Â.
Not to threadjack, or anything, but can we get a ruling from the judges on Mr. Sessions’ use of the line, “Good fences make good neighbors,” please? It’s clearly not used in the spirit of Frost, here; is it acceptable on some other basis?
Just for laughs, does anyone remember when the little jug-eared Martian uttered his “giant sucking sound” remark? In light of our current discussion, could he have been any more wrong?
For Peter Jackson and KH, if one makes an observation of some empirical strength, i.e., the majority of illegal immigrants are from Mexico and points south or most crack arrests are young black men or most CEOs of Fortune 500 companies are white guys with Michael Douglas in “Wall Street” slick hair–it’s not racist or perjorative or anything other than an observation. Yes, there are those who would use such an observation in a pejorative sense, but that possibility does not invalidate the observation.
I find it remarkable that the very governments who have objected (rightfully so in many cases) to U.S. interference in their sovereign affairs, do not recognize the irony of their position on the immigration issue. I offer the following rhetorical question: If Mexico were to construct a wall on the other side of the Rio Grande how long would it take the residents of say, Laredo, to notice?
This has reached a critical point because a) Congress has always tried to do border enforcement on the cheap and b) when faced with the 9/11 attacks operated in time-honored fashion and turned the new Department of Homeland Security into an orgy of pork spending.
We need LEGAL guest workers (just as the countries in question need for us to have them–El Salvador’s GDP is basically remittances in US dollars). We also need the ability to know who goes in and out of the country. If that makes me a racist, so be it.
Fletch  What ER’s? They’ve been closing faster than VHS-only rental shops…
And people think this is about nativist/racist hate? How, I don’t know?
Dick Durbin used the word “we” when refering to those illegal aliens marching in our streets, so he would give the quote above. As for our relationship with Mexico, it’s already pretty bad. Appeasing them only makes it worse.
The alternative is an exercise that would make the Trail of Tears look like a supermodel 1k walk/run for charity in terms of human dislocation.
Ah, the same false choice that Bush offered in his big speech. How about simply enforcing our laws? That will cause many illegal aliens to leave and will cause many not to come. And, if “reform” passes, aren’t we going to enforce it? Or, are we going to “enforce” “reform” like we “enforce” the current “laws”?
Lets say one fine night Mr. al Qaeda slips a cell of one of its teams up through the border, along with the estimated 7-10 thousand coming across daily, in the Mexican pipeline.
If there’s a terrorist attack and the perps come over the border, every other American is not going to be too very happy with all those who’ve advocated for loose immigration and a porous border.
Just call me a bigot and get it over with.
I would be just as concerned if we were facing the prospects of 15 million unassimilating Swedes brigning their socialist work ethic, chronic depression, and unfathomable cinema to our shores.
That is why illegal immigration is bad, because illegals do not assimilate. Their status prevents them from becoming a normal, healthy, functioning citizenry. This is not just bad for us but also for them. Sure in some sense it may represent a ‘step up’ from wherever they came but by that logic we may just as well revive indentured servitude since it’s way better than chattel slavery.
Yes, this means I am opposed to any significant guest worker program, and yes that means that pretty much everyone already here – who is otherwise legally clean – gets a step up onto the first rung of the citizenship ladder. Welcome to the club I say, sign in and pay your dues in a timely manner. But first build the damn wall. Anything else, no matter how hard-assed, or well intentioned, is going to amount to anything until we get our border under our control.
And the whole ‘breaking up families’ trope really chafes. What about the legal immigrants who are already unable to bring their families? And this is not going to get any better once we have to deal with the all of the illegals who will likely get amnesty. I wonder why the press doesn’t play up that angle? I’m sure a little time spent in NYC could locate some poor west African who has been driving a taxi 7/52 for years in the hopes of bringing his wife and kids to America – but what are the odds of anbody playing up the racist angle of illegal Mexicans cutting to the head of the line and worsening his plight?
How about this? If we give the 12 Million Illegals a track to citizenship and most of
them are from Mexico, shouldn’t we in all justice
after that FREEZE immigration from Mexico until intending immigrants from other Nations achieve parity?
Sullivan would make the perfect Star Jones replacement husband.
Then Mexico might be more on a parity with the US and Canada and there would be no problem, we don’t have 12 million Illegal Canadians here.
Some of my ancestors were already here before yours even if yours waded ashore with Columbus, unless yours also walked accross the Berring Straits Landbridge after the end of the Last Ice Age.
Shoot if my ancestors had initiated Immigration Controls back then we would still own this continent
It’s never too late to do the wise thing, mistakes of the past are not proof they need to repeated.
Oh please if any one of us breaks the Law, gets caught and convicted does anyone really believe that
“But you are going to rip me away from my FAMILY” is going to work as a plea to keep out of jail and/or prison?
If the problem is only their illegality, then there is a very easy fix.
Deportation and Life Time Entry Bar, Prison for anyone who aids and abets them to evade Immigration Laws.
That would do it, Oh Deportation and Life Time Entry Bar for anyone Aiding and Abetting who has a Green Card,
Put on the original Visa application a renouncement of Illegal Entry and Make Aiding and Abetting Illegal Entry grounds for Revocation of Citizenship.
That might clear out the brush.
Actus,
As always with you, NO things are not simple. That’s what bullshit artists on both sides of this issue want us to believe. For instance, from one of the posts above–if amnesty/citizenship is granted does that then grant their families the right to petition as it now stands in current law? And what does that do to the other families currently in the line?
Boys, boys! Such levity!
What’s that? You *insist* that I leave an extended quote of myself on this subject? Well [with feigned reluctance], okay.
“We have strong culture, and a powerful self-identity. But it is not immortal. It can be damaged. It can be destroyed. This is what is at stake. For its preservation, we must compromise. We must do what it takes, to dam the flood. And what it takes, I think, is compromise. Citizenship? They do not deserve it and ought not receive it. Legal status? It seems the give part, of give and take. Employer sanctions? Jobs are why they come, mostly. So yes, it is necessary. A wall. Yes, please – long and high. Not to fence anyone in. To fence unwanted, unnecessary, unwelcomed people out. Ours are not prison walls – they are bank walls. We must protect what is valuable, because not all greed is ours.
Why don’t these people, these Congressmen of the Future Confederacy get it? I’m not a big believer in conspiracies. It’s not some vast plot to undermine the concept of national sovereignty. Rather, it’s has to do with a heart that has so much gooey, squishy softness to it that it’s spilled out of the ribcage, refluxed up the esophagus, through the sinuses and into the brain – turning it too into a sort of gingerbread dough. There must be a third half of the brain, somewhere, that they’re using, neither intuitive nor rational – just somehow magical, where nice things happen because you have a kind motive. Maybe that’s the brain the scarecrow got from the Wizard. ‘Cause that’s what it feels like. Oz. But even the Emerald City had a wall.
“Sanity is that state of mind that is most in harmony with reality. Let’s be sane.”
http://forgottenprophets.blogspot.com/2006/05/always-sane.html
Anybody disagree? Your judgment is unsound. In fact, you’re insane.
So there.
J
I think we’ll see some sort of residency program with a path to citizenship for the illegal parents of citizen children.
However wrote about taking citizen kids away from illegal parents over a misdemeanor sounds dumb and heartless and I doubt they are either. emotions run high.
Think about it… the only crimes most of these people commit is crossing a line drawn on a map. It is a drive you home misdemeanor (see Patrick Kennedy). I guess they also break false document laws, but then they get taxes withheld, they pay rent, they pay sales tax, they work hard and are productive. they buy homes and cars they can’t get a license so they break that law too.
They cause no trouble, they are generally good neighbors except for that awful ranchero music with the accordion thingy and the ay ay yi yi yi they break into… I digress
They have children here and the kids are citizens. The way misdemeanors work is you basically get a pass unless you hurt someone or drove drunk… since none of these laws is a felony, most judges would release on own recognizance have a fine paid and send them home to their kids.
Bank robbery, assault etc well of course you put the kids in foster care… but that isn’t the answer, and even if shipped to Mexico, as US citizens the little kids would get benefit checks there right?
So why not leave the kids with mom and dad? It is the decent thing to do, and until the citizenship law is changed (and it won’t be) that is life.
My guess?
Illegal, long term employed with taxes withheld, no criminal record, US citizen children, maybe even a homeowner….. they get amnesty and a fast track to citizenship if they want it. Maybe some paperwork type fines to make the right a little less outraged over the lawbreaking.
Working down from there the bottom of the barrel for amnesty would be single males/females, no problems, two-five year work history with taxes withheld. Everyone else should be sent home or maybe guest workered if they are clean
I think we need to get a few things straight on immigration reform, and this goes out to folks like Dan.
Dan, a lot of us who want to secure the border and reduce immigration from Mexico are fond of Mexican immigrants and would love to see them become Americans (even the illegal ones). We want them to learn English, golf, and buy hip-hop CDs for their spoiled kids. We want them to invite us over for their daughter’s Quinceanera and get fat on their food. We know that they’ve broken the law, but we also remember that we too have broken the law. They are not criminals any more than I. My friends and I use to break-in to our math teacher’s office and chop rails on his desk in the middle of the night. Should we be penalized forever for such criminality? I think a fine and a ticket to the back of the line will do.
A good portion of the Republican leaning side wants a citizenship track and a TWP. You can whirl around in your idealism all you want, but if you aren’t willing to compromise then I guess you’ll just have to form a single-issue third party in the next two elections. I don’t really care to tell you the truth. You guys fucked up and shot your load before a compromise bill was even started.
Just do us a favor and spare us the Koslike drama. It’s creepy and annoying.
I think we need to get another thing straight: Nativism is not synonymous with racism. It’s an assertion and defense of perceived American cultural “purity†in the face of any “other.†So, stop acting like little victims when I accuse you of displaying it.
Just to keep things on the up-and-up, do you believe that illegals will stay or go based on whether we educate their children?
My notion of how to handle this can be succinctly encapsulated by “if you stop building it, they will stop coming”. A wall doesn’t keep people from wanting to come here illegally, and taking away the free concession stand is (I believe) not as much of a deterrent as shutting down the ballpark completely. Lastly, the wall doesn’t do anything to address the issue of the millions already here. This particular measure might provide some coverage for the small chunk of the border it’s going to span, but the other sixteen hundred miles will still be wide open, and the incentive to cross will still be there.
I found this intro to the rant on Sullivan’s site pretty funny:
I suppose in Sully’s world, the list of things “that Republicans once held dear” and Bush has repudiated would include gay marriage, somewhere very near the top…
One can only be impressed by the extent that Left-leaning commentary on immigration is focused on wringing the last drop of political advantage from the issue, as if it were an purely academic matter. Commentary on the Right, even if often emotional and divided, tends to be actually talking about the problem at hand.
It’s disingenuous to insist, as someone did above, that it is prima facie absurd to tie border enforcement to immigration issues.
Up to a certain point (which we are unlikely to get anywhere near, since it would require disproportionately draconian measures – mining the border, for instance, or in general allowing use of deadly force to defend it against civilians) stricter enforcement measures will simply lead to more creative attempts to circumvent them.
It seems to me that reducing the pressure on the border (the number who try to cross illegally) could be a plausible element in a broader strategery to accomplish the tangible goal of fewer people succeeding in violating the border.
It may not be the best way, and we should have an honest discussion to convince ourselves whether it is. But to say border enforcement and immigration have nothing to do with each other is to ignore reality completely.
But I do agree with the direction of this thread: there are a variety of different problems interacting here:
*) The GWoT security problem
*) The law-and-order problem
*) The assimilation problem
*) The problem of overburdened social services
*) The problem of illegals taking jobs from Americans
*) The problem of illegals depressing wages
*) The problem of illegals being almost indispensible in certain sectors of the economy
*) The problem of maintaining friendly relations with our neighbor Mexico’s government (which we could also call the Chavez problem…)
And there are probably others.
There is a natural tendency to over-sell the benefits of the policies one favors, and over-sell the negative effects of policies one opposes. In truth, the competing proposals here differ mainly in the degree they tolerate some problems in order to solve others.
Since there is no panacea that solves every problem without exacerbating others or creating new ones, what we should really be talking about is which problems we should concentrate on
solving, and which we can more easily live with.
OK let’s get my views on record.
We have 12 million Illegal Aliens in this country,
We have an example of the dangers of unassimilated immigrant population in large numbers supplied to us by France last fall.
We are not in the same boat as France there are jobs here for an immigrantpopulation, we do not have massive welfare enclaves of unemployeed immigrants YET.
I do not advocate rounding up all 12 million illegls with Federal troops and herding them back to Mexico.
I am for registration in place of those WORKING during a Grace Period ONLY if the employers of Illegal Aliens ALSO turn themselves in and register.
Bad boys and girls go forth and sin no more.
For those who do NOT take advantage of some Grace period and register?
I stated my views on that above.
Come here and give us the respect that a guest owes their host, wish to become AMERICANS? Start a new Life with the opportunity available?
You are welcome.
You say you want YOUR friends to become citizens?
Well I have friends who are foreign nationals who also want to come here and become citzens.
They don’t happen to be Mexican
We naturalised 9,069,685 citizens between 1980 and 2003.
Why should your friend be fast track to the exclusion of the rest of the world?
12 million citizenships are more than we naturalised in almost a quarter of a century.
Add to that relatives. I want you to justify your position.
I have a girlfriend in St Petersburg Russia if we decide for her to come her for us to get married I will be signing a contract with the US government to be financially responsible for her whether the marriage lasts or not until she has paid into the Social Security System 40 working quarters.
Anyone who wishes to sponsor a Mexican Illegal Alien under those conditions I applaud them.
But I don’t think there will be many takers unlless they are engaged, Most will be fine with the Taxpayers supporting anyone who is here and can’t work.
I am for border interdiction, we have paramilitary cadres crossing at will in the employ of the Cartels running ops deep inside our borders/
I am AGAINST Non=Citizen counts be used by the Census for Congressional Apportionment.
I want to see some one try to justify THAT practice.
I am REALLY ticked off by this Bronze Continent Hispanics belong here meme.
My ancestors kicked DeSoto out of their land in 1540.
The Dineh (Navaho) drove the Mexicans back accorss the Rio Grande in 1846.
Its true neither did so well against the English and the Americans, but that is the past, however ,
this was and IS our Land and I RESENT someone coming in from outside and thinking they get to decide who belongs here.
This Land in the North does NOT belong to them it NEVER did.
We are a New People with our own Land those who come with respect are welcome the rest and go back where they and their ancestors came from.
Except Actus himself.
[/zen]
*Left-leaning commentary on immigration is focused on wringing the last drop of political advantage from the issue, as if it were an purely academic matter*
In the “reality based community” immigration IS an academic matter.
Did I miss an election?
When did the Senate get 83 right-wingers and only 17 left wingers?
When did protecting the border, enforcing the Law become something the Left Wing is not interested in?
Oh silly question.
Gary, it was the country’s reaction to Al Gore winning the 2000 election. Just where the hell have you been, man?
Jeff,
Sorry, not for you or anyone (unless given a direct order by a superior officer) will I go read Sully anymore. Pisses me off and makes me sad at the same time. Kind of like bad scotch.
Could we just annex Mexico and make it the 51st state? Maybe just a Province or U.S. Territory?
OK. I’ll play ball. I made the following comment yesterday at Ace’s site:
1. Secure the border now. Enforce existing laws.
2. Give resident illegal aliens (of all nationalities) 90 days to register with I.N.S. Their naturalization process will take 9 years.
3. After 90 days, deport every detained illegal immigrant. They can never again enter the U.S.
4. Allow 300,000 Mexican immigrants to register with I.N.S. and enter the U.S. legally each year. Their naturalization process will take 6 years.
5. (This point provided by Aaron) Subtract 3 years from the naturalization process any person who serves as many years in the military.
This plan does several things. It repremands those who broke the law, it rewards those who follow the law, it provides a steady stream of lower wage workers, it provides tax revenue, and helps to slow inflation.
I support immigrants (legally residing). They are no different than our great grandparents that came to this county 100 years ago. They work harder, longer, and for less pay than their American counterparts. They’re happy to do it. They just want a better life. Wouldn’t all of us want the same thing?
At least you get some benefit from the scotch.
You can use it as a mouthwash and spit it out.
Boy that would be a real final solution! No more problems at all.
Why do amnesty and citizenship go together? People who get green cards ahve to wait 5 or 7 years to get citizenship. Likewise people with other visas have to wait 5-7 years to get green cards.
I never envisioned amnesty as jumping ahead of those 10-14 years. Rather its starting the countdown on those.
But again, if the problem is peoples families coming over, then the only problem isn’t their lack of assimilation. Then the problem is that there are people whose families we don’t want here.
Because historically we didn’t count just voters. Also the constitutional text is pretty clear: “whole numbers of persons in each state.”
Fourteenth Amendment, anyone?
That says whole numbers of persons in each state.
And then, reading on, says:
Hopefully I don’t have to explain what this means.
Oops. Hmmm. Missed the “citizens” part.
Possibly that was the initial point, but having screwed up badly, I make my exit.
More importantly you missed the part about the denial of franchise. The male and 21 requirements are probably gone from that.
But this is about what to do in case of disenfranchisement. Not how to measure representation overall. And the solution is that representation should decrease to the extent you disenfranchise eligible voters.
That Florida’s representation should have been reduced to the extent they disenfranchised people incorrectly as felons.
Let me know when you’ve got a solid figure for that.
Hey, why stop there? Why not reduce representation to the extent of ballot spoilage?
It shouldn’t be that hard to look at their felon database and then find out how many actually are felons.
And error rates on machines? Sounds like a great idea.
Rasmussen finds greater than 60% in every state favoring border security primarily except MA where a majority still favored the “right wing” approach.
Yep we are all nuts. Right.
True, but that doesn’t speak to how many folks were actually disenfranchised because they were incorrectly put on the felon list.
Google is your friend, in this. Consider that the supervisors of election were told to implement the felon list according to their discretion (in 2000, at least), and some ignored it completely. The USCCR failed to produce much in the way of evidence that the felon list was a factor.
Of course, maybe you could add on extra representatives for having folks vote illegally in various ways. Not being a big fan of your proposal, though, I’m not much of a fan of this idea either.
Then that answers the question. If there was no disenfranchisement, then FL’s representation shouldn’t be reduced. But if people were improperly removed from voter rolls, then they should be.
Its not really my idea. Just the constitution.
Slart, you know better than to play with the untouchable actus (in the Hindu caste manner of speaking, not the Billy bad-ass Hollywood The Untouchables kind, unless you’re into S&M and want Sean Connery to smack you around like an uppity split-tail).
He’s making a point, which is moronic, that citizenship and amnesty are not the same thing. No? No. But then again, citizenship is bestowed upon their children and many of the benefits of American society go to residents such as schooling, medical care, Sam’s Club memberships, and a Starbucks on every city block.
Don’t get at him about the legal minutiae, which is porn star fellating gay, when you can say, in plain english, hey, actus, you are a complete moron because you forgot to carry the one on the FIRST FUCKING STEP. Better yet, leave the nancy boy alone. Give him some privacy to jerk his baby gerkin.
The reduction of representation because some folks were put on a list, that was your idea. I simply pointed out that idea didn’t directly translate to disenfranchisement that would kick in a reduction of representation per the Constitution.
But, granted, superenfranchisement (a word I just made up, sure) doesn’t have any hooks in the Constitution, either. I was just offering some proportional retaliation of silliness.
No.
Key word: incorrectly. Actus actually had perhaps 25% of a point, there.
– Something like the Demoratic party these days.
I said incorrectly. While I am against felon disenfranchisement as a policy, it seems the constitution allows it. But it only allows it when you actually are a felon. Not when Choicepoint identifies that you are a felon with a conviction date in the future.
And those darn federalists back in the day.
Being a felon loses you quite a few of your Civil Rights, the franchise not being the only one.
Like involuntary servitude? the 13th amendment has an except for in the case of felons.
Check this out:http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-fi-jobs18may18,0,4447580.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Hey Dan… I assume you are native american?
If so, then you know that most mexicans are mixed blood indians?
Their families just walked a little further than yours did after crossing the land bridge up north. Then they mixed with the Spaniards during colonization.
What part of ‘incorrectly’ don’t you understand?
natesnake: 5. (This point provided by Aaron) Subtract 3 years from the naturalization process any person who serves as many years in the military.
I may be mistaken, but I believe right now any non-citizens who serve a term in the U.S. military actually become full naturalized citizens once their initial term is completed. So your proposal of subtracting years from a naturalization process would be a step backwards.
Frankly, I am quite okay with offering full-fledged citizenship to non-citizens who serve in the U.S. military.
Ignore actus.
He is that guy from Silence of the Lambs, flinging monkey sputum through the bars of his cage as sane people go about their day. Unless you like a solid microgram of man-goo in your eye every other post.
</blockquote>Hey Dan… I assume you are native american?
If so, then you know that most mexicans are mixed blood indians?
Their families just walked a little further than yours did after crossing the land bridge up north. Then they mixed with the Spaniards during colonization.
Posted by SteveG | permalink
on 05/18 at 03:55 PM</blockquote>
Yep and the tribes up here have in the Past already experienced folks from that region coming North and claiming our land as theirs.
I am part Cherokee, we waxed DeSotos tail in 1540, in 1846 the Navaho had driven their Mexican Oppressors BACK south of the Rio Grande. They are indigenous to THERE not here.
I reject their Bronze Continent Bullshit that claims THEY get to decide who belongs here.
“”Chicano is our identity; it defines who we are as people. It rejects the notion that we…should assimilate into the Anglo-American melting pot…Aztlan was the legendary homeland of the Aztecas … It became synonymous with the vast territories of the Southwest, brutally stolen from a Mexican people marginalized and betrayed by the hostile custodians of the Manifest Destiny.” (Statement on University of Oregon MEChA Website, Jan. 3, 2006)”
HAH! Brutally stolen from the Mexican Invaders and Bringers of Genocide they really mean.
La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada For the Race all, for outside the Race nothing, that is the message they brought North in the Past.
Don’t bother to point out how the British and Americans did the same. That fact instills in the Latinos NO right of possesion to the North.
The 14th amendment uses the term “persons” so as to prevent former slaves from being left out. But it still excluded Indians, not taxed.
We don’t have that problem now, so it is probably best to correct that language.
With a Constitutional Amendment.
There are two possible results.
One the Amendment is passed and this travesty ends
Two Progressive Democrats manage to block it since they derive several dozen extra seats in the House and Electoral Votes by the status quo
In the latter case, it would be a bitter price to pay, but the end result might be the End of the Democratic Party as a National Political force.
They might never elect a President again and their hold on the House, the Senate and Governorships would be limited to where their local numbers were a super-majority, because the majority of citizens would favour such an Amendment.
Tempting as that scenerio would be I would still favour the Amendment being passed.
Note the constitution says participation, not conviction. So if we’re going to alter representation for the number of people incorrectly off the voter rolls as felons, we should then add back in the number of people that participated in a crime but were never convicted.
Hey, it makes as much sense.
At the risk of traversing already well-trodden paths once more, I want to point out that “incorrectly off the voter rolls” does not equate to “disenfranchised”. Or, getting back to the text of the Fourteenth Amendment, “abridged”.
Dan, what fraction of your ancestry is Cherokee, anyway?
By Blood Quanta? Not that much probably by that measure, but while I am not a Pure Blood I am not Ward Churchill either.
I get my Cherokee ancestory from my Mother’s side who was told of it by Her Mother and Great-Aunts, who were told of it by THEIR Mother and Great-Aunts.
The Family went into hiding in Western Kentucky at the time of the Nunna daul Tsuny/The Trail Where They Cried/Trail of Tears.
For a few generations being Cherokee was a Family Secret, being a “breed” of any sort was not something a lot folks advertised back then,
I got my Ancestory as a small boy at the Feet of My Grandmother and Great-Aunts.
My Great-Aunt Ruby was a Medicine Woman, I remember her telling me as a boy.
“Danny you just LOOK white, NEVER forget that you are REALLY Cherokee.”
So maybe about as much by blood quanta as John Ross the Great Chief of the Cherokee Nation at the time of the Trail of Tears by blood quanta he was 7/8ths White.
Tell me?
If your Father and Grandfather, and Great-Grandfather, and Great-Great-Grandfathers had all married women who were citizen of a country other than the US?
What fraction of your ancestory would be American?
PS the oral tradition in our family is very strong, living to 90 or 100 with a clear mind is rather common, one ancestor had a lifetime that bridged the Revolutionary and Civil War. 4 to 5 generations alive at one time was rather frequent.
So no I am not a Pure Blood, no I am not Ward Churchill, I didn’t buy being Cherokee like buying a membership.
But I am just as much Cherokee as I am American.
For the same reasonss only the Cherokee Ancestors were here a lot longer than the Immigrant to American ancestors.
Dan, thanks for the response. Your picture on your website didn’t look as if you had a great deal of Cherokee in you, but I realize that relying on that kind of assessment is problematic.
Me, I have no problem with Mexicans, etc gaining citizenship through legal means. I do think that the current approach where folks come into this country in violation of the law and are employed by companies that break the law while our government looks the other way is wrong and has zero integrity.
Hope I didn’t offend; I certainly meant no offense.
None taken