Is there anybody else here who just cannot make up their mind on illegal immigrants?

Great Debates
21

One issue that no one seems to have mentioned. Why are so many Republicans (read Big Business) are in favor of leaving enforcement as it is, and/or creating a guest worker program? It’s because they can *get * this labor at slave wages. There is no job I know of that Americans aren’t willing to do; pay enough and people will do it.

Of course, the problem is, if you strictly enforce immigration restrictions, some businesses will go down the tubes (particularly the more shoe-string operations), some will move out of the country, and we will be condemning folks to returning to conditions that must be Pretty Fucking Bad if living here doing lousy work for lousy pay and scraping every spare penny together to send back home (some even leaving wives/husbands/children at home) is superior. Also, I don’t feel that illegal immigration should be turned into a felony. If I’m not mistaken, this would preclude them from EVER entering the country legally.

So I’m about as firmly on the fence as I’ve ever been in my life! And like Sampiro, I usually have pretty strong views on political issues!

22

I’d love to get a reliable estimate of the economic impact of eliminating illegal immigration. A while ago I started a thread on the topic, the basic gist of which was that an effective anti-illegal program would spur real interest among the electorate to finally make reasonable and substantive changes to our immigration laws. The motivator, of course, would be money: Certain goods and services would skyrocket in price, Joe Sixpack would demand relief, and the rest would follow.

Then someone pointed out there would be no skyrocketing prices. The difference would be, at most, just pennies on the dollar. Links were provided to careful analysis of agricultural labor supporting the claim.

So, I want to know: Do we actually need illegal immigration? Because if we don’t, there’s no need to change the existing laws, and there are a host of good reasons to actually enforce them for a change. Mexico’s shitty economy shouldn’t be our problem.

Six months ago, I was in a position to hire a woman from Japan for a tech position. She was by far my favorite candidate, and wanted to work with us. It was like somebody created the perfect fit for the position and handed her to me on a platter. Trouble was, her current visa was about to run out, and she had to go back to Japan to reapply. My employer is absolutely scrupulous about hiring practices, right down to the folks we contract to do our cleaning. I could offer her the job, but I was looking at a minimum of six months before her legal return. I was willing to wait, but my superiors and HR were not. So, playing by the rules, I lost the best candidate, and she lost her shot at the job she said she really wanted above all others. We kept in touch by email for a few months, but she got a job in Japan and decided to stay. Meawhile, I basically lost my fight to hold out for a comparable candidate, and had to hire someone who I was less happy with. Life would have been so much better if we had tried to fudge things a little, just sneak around the rules somehow, but we would never do that.

I find it odd that the sorts of highly-skilled, law-abiding people we do actually need quite badly to fill positions in tech sectors can wind up anti-immigrating when they attempt to comply to our immigration laws. Meanwhile, jobs that anyone with a pair of hands could do appear to be so valued we will allow quite literally anyone who can get to the border of AZ or NM unrestricted access, and claim they somehow have a right to it. Why are the white collar workers being punished for being law abiding? Because they’re needed less than berry-pickers? I’d really like some assurance of that if I’m to get on board, quite frankly.

23

The other side of that coin is the Democrats who don’t want to control illegal immigration because they hope to build a power base among the immigrants, as they did in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and don’t care about the impact that illegal immigration has on the low income folks who are already here.

The immensely frustrating thing for me is that both the major parties regard my rights and interests in this matter as expendable.

24

And what are your rights in this regard, exactly?

25

It’s a huge and complex problem, but my issue with the “definitively AGAINST” allowing Mexicans crowd is that regardless of their half-assed, partly true arguments, it really gets down to an Anti-Brown attitude, at which time I no longer care to debate the issue with them.

I see the problems of unbridled or illegal immigration. I also see the benefits. I find more and more that as far as I’m concerned, the issue comes in near the bottom of my list of Big Concerns. Certainly far behind The War, Social Security and Affordable Healthcare, Crimes Committed with Guns and General Idiocy In The White House. And that’s just my domestic list.

I have a feeling that this sudden outrage over a problem that’s been around for decades (virtually unaddressed) is a thinly veiled, orchestrated attempt to detract our attention from the abysmal job goverment is doing in addressing my Big Concerns listed above. And in this country, it’s just so easy to blame the Brown Guy for our problems because as a rule, we hate 'em anyway.

26

Ah, yes. Accuse the other side of racism, and that settles the problem for you. You know what the real laugh here is? You probably think of yourself as open-minded and intellectually sophisticated.

27

The right to, as a citizen, decide who and how gets to become an American? It’s a matter of degree: murderers, for instance, should not become Americans. Those fleeing from political repression and whose other choice is death should. The debate is about those in between.

And also about who should decide this: the politicians or the people? Well, the politicians in practise, obviously, barring direct democracy initiatives, but if some politicians say they will crack down on illegal immigration but don’t, there really isn’t much one can do to effect change.

28

I’m with you, Sampiro. :frowning:

I’ve seen the dreadful lives that these people lead. I’ve lived in the southern half of Texas for close on fifteen years now, and I’ve known a few people who came to the States less than legally. They’ve been a rough split between people who just work like ordinary immigrants, toiling every hour of the day and night to make a life for their children, and people who believe they’re owed something from us for some arcane reason, who see no problem with breaking laws or doing whatever they feel they need to in order to live as they please.

My tentative suggestion would be the same as Sampiro’s, but adding on more reasonable entry requirements. Apparently (I got this from another SDMB thread, so someone else’s thread is my cite :wink: ) we have the same numerical limits on Mexican immigrants as we have on, say, immigrants from Luxembourg. Strikes me as silly, in my opinion. I think we could allow more people in legally.

Problem is, if we’re to go this route, we’re going to have to make border security utterly ferocious…

29

Oh…that’s right. LonesomePolecat says there’s no racism involved in this problem. It must be true. Impressive!

30

I’m a (legal) immigrant. My view is that you Americans first need to decide what you want from immigrants. The way the law is written at the moment, to immigrate to the US you generally need one of these things:
(1) special skills to get an employment-based visa;
(2) family member or fiance(e) who is a US citizen;
(3) luck in winning the Green Card Lottery.

(I arrived first in category (1), then made myself permanent in category (3)).

Except for category (2), none of this works for all the low-skilled illegals from Mexico. (They can’t get into category (3), becaise that’s for people who send fewer immigrants to the US). So, you need to decide if you want tens of millions of low-skilled immigrants from third world countries. And if you do, do you want them to come mainly from Mexico, or do you want them from other places in Latin America, Africa and Asia?

If you do want them, then set up an immigration system which makes it easier for Juan, Mohammed and Kali to migrate to the US legally than illegally. If you don’t want them, then set up a system where it is not financially worthwhile for employers to employ them (because they are likely to be caught and have to pay a heavy penalty).

31

Excellent observations, Giles. I’ve long complained that the major problems here are a nightmarish bureaucracy that makes legal immigration next to impossible, and unscrupulous employers who are perfectly willing to break the law to get cheap, docile workers.

32

Blinded by ideology a little bit?

2002 we were, of course, distracted by the thought of mushroom clouds blossoming over American cities.

2004 we were, of course, busy engaging in battle with the Pink Menace

2006 we’ll be protecting good gawd-fearing Americans from the Brown Menace…unless something bigger and better can be manufactured by November.

Tell me, sir, why wasn’t this a huge issue in 1998? 2000? 2002? 2004? Has something happened to make this suddenly THE PROBLEM that needs to be dealt with yesterday?

-Joe

33

I’m curious, as a point of information, if there’s any modern industrial democratic society that doesn’t have an immigrant underclass – often illegal – cleaning houses, picking vegetables, tending yards, doing demolition, etc. And maybe, if it’s the case that modern industrial society always needs these people, at least until they can be replaced by robots, it’s time to make peace with the phenomenon.

34

Yes – to a large extent that’s true of Australia and New Zealand. They achieve this partly by luck (the borders are much easier to defend if they are all oceans), and partly by design (the rules for immigrating to those places emphasise job skills and education).

There are poor people in those countries to do the low-skilled jobs, but they are mostly home-grown, and some are indigenous (Aboriginal and Maori).

35

The OP describes my position pretty well, although I’m leaning more and more towards the idea of a guest worker program. Initially, my reaction was-- round 'em up and send 'em back. And maybe if I thought we actually could do that, I’d still be in favor of it. Seems to me, though, that this is pretty much like the “drug problem”. The cure (drug laws as the exist now) is worse than the disease, and you’re just fighting a losing battle. Better to deal with the reality of the situation.

Having said that, I’m not at all sure that guest worker program will work either. I just think it’s worth a shot, since we don’t have the ability or the political will to use the get tough approach. I would not be surprised if a guest worker program would turn our current 2-tiered system (citizens/residents and illegal aliens) into a 3-tiered system (citizen/residents, guest workers, and illegal aliens). Has any country made a guest worker program work? By “work” I mean, set up a system where they actually return to their countries when their term is up. If we end up caving in and letting them stay on to become citizens, that defeats the whole purpose-- stemming the tide of an ever increasing illegal population in the US.

36

Yes, and of course NONE of the Republican people who do want a strictly enforcement policy are motivated by politics, just as they weren’t when considering the Dubai Ports deal or Terry Schiavo. :rolleyes:

If we truly want to control illegal immigration, Giles has it dead right. Make it economically disadvantageous to businesses to hire them. It will take a bit longer than border control, but it’s also likely to be *far * more effective. Yes, you’ll still get a few coming to do private service jobs such as housecleaning or day labor, but I suspect the numbers will be insignificant when compared to those employed by established businesses.

37

Because both political parties didn’t want it on the table. The dems favor more liberal immigration, in part because they believe eventually that they will gain votes. The reps didn’t want to deprive big business of a cheap labor pool. An unholy alliance if there ever was one. It became an issue only after the Minutemen shined a light on the problem, and Tom Tancredo, (R) Colorado, made this his cause in congress.

The fact is the problem was kept in the dark. The fact that 12 million people are here now illegally is proof of the problem. Unless, of course, you don’t view people millions of people sneaking into our country without background and health checks a problem.

38

I can think of 20 guys who got into this country who caused a problem. Didn’t they get these checks that you think would make a big difference?

-Joe

39

Huh? You asked a question baout why it was an issue now and I answered it. Now you bring up the hijackers? Do you do so because you think that their ability to game the system shows that enforcement of our immigration laws was NOT a problem prior to 9/11? If anything, that was a large contributing factor to the focus on our borders. With all the talk and posturing at the time you would have thought that the borders would have been sealed by now. But for the power of the unholy alliance it would have been.

40

Do you perhaps fail to notice those posts where I clearly showed that I am very unhappy with both the left and the right on this issue?