Pwned.
Just to be clear-I am not trying to be confrontational here. I am genuinely interested in this topic and feel there needs to be major changes to our approach. Just not sure what those would be…
You know what the definition of “immigrant” is, right?
It’s somebody who got here after you did.
Like elanorigby, I don’t have the stamina to withstand an argument (or, to be frank, the knowledge about this issue that others here seem to possess–though I do pay as much attention and try to understand as much as I can, and I pride myself on making earnest attempts at thinking **very ** critically about my positions (which, nine-to-one, are decidedly liberal, FWIW). And though there are some points that she made with which I may find myself at variance, I just wanted to say that hers is one of the best posts that I’ve seen in this thread. No doubt.
Well, my family arrived in 16-something. So, perhaps you’re right. I don’t think it’s relevant, except to add snark to an already heated discussion. I don’t think anyone here is against immigration per se-just illegal immigration.
Thanks, Lil Puck. I must have been clearer than I thought.
Lil pLuck sorry…
You’re quite welcome. And, as far as I’m concerned, you were clear.
Yes there are programs that deal with each and everyone of the things you mention.
Extreme poverty has been reduced in the last 12 years from 50% to 17%.
Many workers have free medical provided through the Instituto Mexicano de Seguro Social. I pay 37% of my employees salaries to IMSS. This also includes individual retirement accounts and a housing fund for low interest mortgages. They qualify for housing under a government program known as INFONAVIT or Instituto del Fondo Nacional de Vivienda para los Trabajadores which put over 1 million families in houses during Fox’s term.
For others that aren’t included through IMSS, President Fox started a new program called Seguro Popular. People with minimum incomes can sign up for free and recieve free basic health care. People that make above 150 pesos a day can enroll their families for 640 pesos a year.
Vaccinations for childhood diseases are free and programs aimed at administraing them in poor rural areas are very effective. Our birthrate is only slightly higher than that of the USA.
For the story about the woman blasting the education system, yes there are problems there also. A lot still depends on where you go to school. But you probably don’t know that education through the university level is free. My children attended public elementary and jr. high and my daughter was awarded a scholarship to a prestigious private high school and university . They administer the US SAT for admissions and she scored over 1200 at 13 years of age. So I wouldn’t say the woman’s story is a completely accurate assessment.
I never called you racist for starters. And as far as I know no one here has asked the US to “clean up” our mess. The policy of the Mexican government has always been oriented towards legal immigration and assurring humane treatment for the ones there now illegally. Illegal immigration isn’t a one way street. Much of the blame lies north of the border but that isn’t something many Americans want to accept.
What blame? For what? For being a more successful country? We are making people walk thru the desert and have babies here, so that the situation gets complicated and tragic? How do we do that? I just live here. I don’t think about Mexico any more than I think about Italy or Nigeria. They’re just other countries. I don’t understand your point. Please note I am not saying America is without blame, I just don’t know how the blame should be apportioned. I never could understand NAFTA and those kind of programs-and I think they are poorly explained in the media. Plus, given that there is only so much time in the day…I admit to being ignorant of our policies.
It’s great to see that there are such programs-I hope they do well in the future. We don’t see the successful, progressive side of Mexico depicted in the media and that is wrong. We also don’t see the positive side of nationalized health in Canada or EU for that matter-I don’t know why: ignorance or rampant cynicism on the part of media editors, perhaps. But the question remains: if things are so good there-why do so many want out?
RE girls in school. What (very) little I know about it comes from a report on NPR re Hispanic girls HERE. Very few graduate from high school here. A unit secretary I knew was a first generation American; she graduated, but refused to go to college, despite teacher reccomendations, grades and available funds. Her sister did not graduate from HS at all. Sure, this is one family, but it this young girl who reiterated what I had learned from the NPR report. She didn’t want to “out-earn” the men; she didnt’ want to try and fail. She will be a unit secretary her whole life with that attitude. There is nothing wrong with that, but she could do so much more.
Of course she is not representative of an entire country or gender. I only bring her up because the drop out rates for Hispanic (and all minority) females (and males) is a concern in this country. IMS, the young boy who wanted to do well in school, but wasn’t challenged lived in a more rural area. God knows many of the USA’s schools are poor as well-but to not be reading in first grade (or being taught to read) is criminal. Again, the details are a bit sketchy, and I’m sorry for that, but that is what I remember from the story. I wish I could remember what show I heard it on-I would find the link.
I didn’t say you called me racist–I was speaking to the tone of this thread that seemed (to me at least) to be that if you had concerns re immigration, then you were most likely prejudiced against Mexicans or other immigrants.
I have to get city water that has been cut with pure water if I want something that doesn’t have too much arsenic. It is not at all unusual to find US citizens residing in the US who have either too little water or water unfit to drink due to contaminates or just by its very nature.
Um, I’ve been meaning to ask what is up with the “Oh, noes” in posts.
Just asking.
True Blue Jack
I was aware that there were pockets of unclean water for drinking in the US, but not that it was “not uncommon.” There are lots of places in the US with too little water-most of them near the Mexican border (not impugning anything, just a fact). I am not sure of your point–is it that since this condition exists inside the US, it’s ok for it to exist in Mexico? The world deserves safe, clean water-seems kind of obvious.
I am not sure, but the “noes” is part of l33t speak, I think. It’s supposed to be dismissive of the poster’s position by attempting to characterize their position as immature by replying in an immature manner. Or something like that.
You might start here. I find it notable that race was not eliminated as a basis for ineligibility for naturalization until 1952. The part of the most interest to you may be the bracero program, though that program never provided for allowing participants to remain permanently in the U.S. in any case.
Overall, options for a Mexican citizen to get a green card haven’t changed substantially since the 1960s. And why on Earth are you picking that particular point in time?
P.S. IMNSHO any comprehensive overhaul of the U.S. immigration system that doesn’t provide for some path to permanent residency for a large proportion of the people who are here illegally is doomed to failure, quite simply. A temporary guest worker program would be a nice start, but as the German situation amply demonstrates, temporary worker programs have a way of becoming not so temporary.
You should count yourself fortunate that you were born in circumstances that have allowed you to become educated and literate in the language of the country where you live. Hundreds of millions of people aren’t so lucky.
The devil is in the details. First, I would be VERY careful in this regard to distinguish between permanent residency and citizenship for this purpose. By law, most permanent residents have a waiting period of 5 years before they are even eligible to apply for citizenship (three years if they are married to a U.S. citizen for that whole period). Five years is enough for most people to learn basic, functional conversational English in any case.
However, I think the level of English already required in order to naturalize isn’t so horrible, and I don’t have a problem with the test in its current form. I would be VERY cautious of requiring a high level of sophistication in complex English - I think it’s an unnecessary barrier to participation in political life. People are perfectly capable of being functional members of American society without placing about the 50th percentile on the GRE Verbal. And for that matter, let’s worry about having the majority of native-born American high school students understand your average ballot initiative (hell, I’d settle for them paying attention to your average ballot initiative!) before we worry about some imaginary scourge of apathetic immigrants.
I wouldn’t call it offensive, but I would call it silly and inaccurate. How brown are all of these people? Or about about these?
All of these people are from “Mexico and points south”. You’re using a hell of a broad brush there. You know there’re lots of countries and over half a billion people from “Mexico and points south”? You know they’re not all Spanish speakers? You know that most of them have as much ancestral claim to Europe as you do?
I’m not getting myself into any sort of fight with you; suffice it to say that I do not agree with your views on immigration – but I can’t hear “brown people” and not hear some sort of ethnicism, if not racism.
What I’ve noticed on the boards is when the subject of illegal immigration comes up, frequently people will delineate between “desirable” illegals from say, Ireland or Canada, and imply racism by referring to the “undesirable” illegals from all points south. The ones from the south are “brown skins” and the ones from the north are not. Never mind what their skin color actually is. It’s just an easy way to imply your opponents are racist. CBEscapee for instance, uses it here.
Sometimes it’s confusing to me whether it’s politically correct to consider Latinos “brown skins” or politically incorrect to consider them “brown skins.”
In my personal real life experience, I really don’t get the whole “brown skin” thing. It seems like a euphemism for “people I think you don’t want.”
Policies like NAFTA and CAFTA were offered to Canada and Mexico as ways to level the playing field as it were, but especially with Mexico, they have done much more damage. They allow US corporations to take advantage of the cheaper goods made by the Mexicans and the local businesses can’t compete effectively with the huge American conglomerates. I think. I only recently started paying attention to politics. Perhaps CBEscapee has more or better information.
No, I do not find that odd because you have to remember that America is a country of immigrants and that the American culture is merely the sum of the other cultures that make it up. Making English the official language is like telling someone that they can paint a picture or make a mosaic but the only blue that they can use is cerulean. Cerulean’s not an ugly color, to be sure. But’s it’d be rather boring if it were the only blue, yanno?
I agree that our immigration system is broken and it needs to be fixed. It is reprehensible that people wishing to enter the US must wait as long as they are. But dumping busloads of illegals back across the border isn’t going to make the legals’ wait go any faster and it won’t fix the underlying cause which is the economic divide between the US and Mexico.
Yes, exactly, we can make any laws we want. We can craft a guest worker program and enforce it. The problem you cite in Germany is thereby avoided. We can also redefine the 14th Amendment any way we’d like. Like all laws, they would be crafted in ways to discourage behavior we view as undesireable and to encourage behavior that we feel benefits us. As far as people having to pick upand move after eight months, I don’t see a problem,as they would have known that that was the deal before they came.
I’m sorry, did you not realize that the practical aspect of having English as the official language would be to not have to print they myriad forms in heavens knows how many languages? Does that change your view?
As per my post, if I moved to Country X I’d want to avail myself of the most job opportunities; take advantage of cultural opportunities like plays, lectures, even movies; go into one of the many restaurants and be able to read the menu, read signs that have been put up because someone thought they are value, read communications from companies and the government, ask someone walking down the street a question, Have more options on my television, read ingrediants and warnings on packages, be able to call up my health insurance comnpany and ask a question, read a simple contract, etc.
While it is possible to get by, I would be doing myself a disservice by limiting myself so much.
Yes, of course. The private sector is and should be able to attract customers in any way that makes sense for them.
Is it any more inaccurate than “blacks” as a descriptor? I have no stock in the phrase. I used it because I thought it was a useful term used to describe, people from Mexico and Central America. I didn’t make this term up. I’ve heard Juan Williams, Tony Brown, and many others use the term. If you or others can show me that it is, in fact, offensive I wiil cease using it.
Yes it is a broad brush, but in a discussion about illegal immigration and our southern border I’d bet it’s fairly accurate. Do you disagree?