OK—one more thing.
I think everything you said supports my point, since I said nothing about “re-entry.”
And, establishing a kind of residence, maintaining a job, having a family–all these can occur which would have a bearing on a determination of eligibility.
He appears to be talking about deportation, generally, and not deportation with respect to specific factors. Note that at 2’00" or so he points out that “it doesn’t mean we can’t make decisions, for example to emphasize enforcement on those who’ve engaged in criminal activity.”
The furor over this is really incomprehensible when you stop and think about it. Are the plan’s opponents of the opinion that we shouldn’t be focusing our efforts on deporting criminals?
(It keeps pulling me back…)
Well, yeah. But that’s what this thread is about–removing the possibility of deportation of illegal aliens.
He also states, “There are enough laws on the books by congress that are very clear in terms of how we have to enforce our immigration system that, for me to simply, through executive order, to ignore those congressional mandates, (it) would not conform with my appropriate role as president.”
I feel that this is the salient point.
You can read the transcript of the entire town hall meeting herel
You do realize that that was over 50 years ago, right?
Also, can you point to any politician or recognized republican leader advocating any action at all similar to Operation Wetback?
Well, certainly anyone who argues that the president is wrong to target criminals for deportation rather than just deporting every undocumented immigrant is implicitly calling for such an operation. They might not want to admit it or they might even be dumb enough that they don’t understand what would be required to accomplish their goals, but that doesn’t change the fact that this is the sort of thing they are advocating.
Heck, the citizenship checks during traffic stops doesn’t sound all that distant from what a recently-passed law in Arizona calls for.
Well, rational people understand that there are more than one side to an argument and that positions have been supplied on both sides. Rational people who have been in immigration discussions understand that each of the topics mentioned have been debate in great detail and that a synopses like the one offered—specifically the one offered—gives just an overly simplistic, hyper-partisan explanation. The type fit for 4th-graders or people who want to be able to copy and paste oh-so-damaging information to people on their email lists. These things exist on both sides and they are beyond dumb. Beyond dumb because of how easily naive people swallow them as fact, hook, line and sinker. I get emails like that from the other side and got into a big fight with a friend of a friend because I told them it was 1) dumb and 2) unhelpful.
In this particular case, it was also like a fleet of dumptrucks unloading tons of straw. Not only was much of that not in discussion, even most of those topics that were being discussed had no one in the debate holding the positions that were apparently eviscerated.
Notice that you used the word “criminal”, singular. Which makes you correct. The President absolutely has the right to use his discretion to pardon an individual. He doesn’t have the authority to circumvent congress and effectively make constitutionally passed laws null and void.
But I LOVE LOVE LOVE how this reality version of Obama contrasts with the idealized version who campaigned on a lighter Executive Touch and, hehe, more transparency. And still people who claimed to love his message defend stuff that goes beyond Bush. Look also at how his administration is handling the national security leaks coming out of them. When Abramoff was the target, Obama thought an Independent Council was necessary to ensure public confidence. And THAT was not even a national security issue. Now? Well, Holder appointed to guys to look at it who will be reporting to him! But that’s fodder for another thread.
I think there is good news about how Obama is handling the immigration issue (and the leaks). And that s that the people who will be paying most attention to these types of things are the Independent voters.
If the people affected agree, they can always leave, no?
Nope. Cite one Republican leader who advocates deporting all illegals that are here. Just one. Go ahead.
As far as your other point, there’s a world of difference between focusing efforts on criminals and deeming that a large swath of the illegal alien population is no longer here illegally. The former is within his powers, the latter I don’t think is. It’s also grossly unhelpful if one is interested in putting Americans back to work or curtailing further illegal immigration.
I didn’t say they said it explicitly. Obviously you don’t read well.
Wikipedia summarizes that book:
I need to address this once more.
You do understand, right, that the action by Obama/Napolitano, de facto, creates exactly this? The president himself said, “This is not a path to citizenship.” That means, if you’re to believe him, that these people will remain as an underclass forever–never reaping the benefits of citizenship while still being required to pay for it–which is exactly the thing that you object to.
(Now, if you’ll allow me a minute to paint a large target on myself…OK, done.)
The idea of “restitution” has been floated in other places. That’s intriguing. Congress could pass a law that allows for the award of citizenship after meeting all of the necessary qualification -plus- restitution (of an amount to be determined by congress later) over a period of time (to be determined by congress later) for illegal aliens. I believe this to be a better option. It would eventually allow for illegals to become citizens, and it would, basically, pre-pay their costs. By passing a law, there wouldn’t be the risk of a future president negating it via executive order or DHS Secretary memo.
I don’t ascribe to the argument, “But they’re already here! They’re already paying!” They may be, but they’re never going to become citizens under the current directives. Under a restitution program, those that really want to become citizens could. Those that want to remain in Obama/Napolitano’s underclass could as well.
Or should this be the topic of a different thread in Great Debates?
I know a lot of Republican voters do. Republican officials are beholden to business interests that depend on cheap immigrant labor. We saw this division within the party manifested when W tried to push through immigration reform in 2006-2007. (It failed.)
Is this specifically addressing California as was your original request for proof?
Only those immigrants who also spent four years studying and paying. And it’s no surprise to American college graduates nowadays that they have to compete with a lot of other college graduates; a few thousand more ain’t a drop in the bucket.
I didn’t see anything in that Wiki cite that mentioned either Republicans or Democrats. But, other than Arlen Specter, all of the co-sponsors of the bill except Kennedy were Republicans.
Also, "In 2006 the Democratic Party won a majority of the state governorships[6] and the U.S. House and Senate seats each for the first time since 1994, an election-year commonly known as the “Republican Revolution.” For the first time in the history of the United States, no Republican captured any House, Senate, or Gubernatorial seat previously held by a Democrat. " (from Wikipedia)
Like I said earlier…observing the aftermath and subsequent carnage would be fascinating.
I can envision where he called out students by name…
"Elizabeth Murray, are you here? Please stand up. Oh, there she is. Congratulations! By the way, the job you wanted in engineering with Boeing was just filled this week by Raoul Morales, an illegal alien. And Peter Ludwigson, please stand up. Your job in systems analysis was taken by Eliazar Castillo, also an illegal alien.
You can both sit down now. But let me tell this graduating class this: Of the 847 of you here today, 51 of you will not be able to get a job because those jobs were either recently filled by illegal aliens, or there was an illegal alien working in those positions who is now allowed to remain here regardless of his immigration status."
Oh, you bet I made those numbers up, but you have to remember that the best estimates I’ve seen is that there are 800,000 people that Obama’s edict applies to. If only 10 percent of those attend college, that’s 80,000. There are approximately 2,400 public and private4-year colleges in the US. That comes out to about 33 illegal aliens per college, but I’m allowing for some colleges being more of a draw to illegal aliens than others, and those were the ones I made up this story about.
In any event, I feel it’s wrong if even one US citizen loses out on a job to that position being taken by an illegal alien.
Not that you could have known, since I wasn’t specific, but I’m not calling your examples and other similar laws exploitation. Even legal aliens cannot vote or hold elective office, but those are things that one chooses to do or seek. I’m talking about the kinds of things some want to deny immigrant workers while being fully happy to benefit from their hard, honest work. Things like health care and aid for education or even the right for their children to attend a public school. Now, if someone is here illegally and doesn’t work and contribute, I have little sympathy for them. But for the others, I think it’s wrong to benefit from their efforts while at the same time trying to deny them all but the most basic things necessary for survival.
Absolutely. But that’s beside my point. See my post #238.
Okay, I can see how you might hold this position. What, then, do you want to do with the illegal aliens who grew up in the USA and were educated in US public schools? Presume, for the sake of argument, that crossing the border or overstaying a visa is a criminal matter. The child who committed those crimes is not legally responsible for them as an adult. So you have an adult who was raised in America, who has committed no crime other than being the child of criminals (again for the sake of example). And you think it’s a good idea to deport them? If nothing else, it’s a bad PR move, as you’ll have thousands upon thousands of young men and women scattered throughout the world with a decent education and a grudge against America.