I wasn't going to post on this, but it was being batted about on Pat White's show yesterday, so I thought I ought to comment. A letter to the editor takes me to task on illegal immigration (or, as the president has taken to calling it, "migration"):
Leo Morris' editorial briefs March 12 were so typical of our new rhetoric. He wrote, "They are right to be worried," regarding a raid on a company in Mishawaka for hiring "illegal immigrants" last week. Morris concludes his brief with "We will continue to keep saying what we always have : What part of 'illegal' are people failing to comprehend?"
My question is, do you really want all the "illegal" immigrants to leave Fort Wayne?
[. . .]
Fort Wayne would shut down in a day if we lost our "illegal" workers. They are an absolutely vital part of our economy, but we can keep them at slave rates (with the ever-present threat of deportation) by keeping the precious word "illegal" and having these bogus raids. The fact is, it is not that we don't want them here; it's that we don't want them here legally.
Yes, a large part of the business community wants to keep illegals here and keep them illegal; it tends to hold costs down. That's one of the factors driving the insane open-border movement. Another is the policy of granting citizen status to the children of illegals born here.
Fort Wayne would shut down? I doubt it. Labor would rush in to fill available jobs, but the costs of some goods and services would go up. We would also end the two-tiered system of employment that exploits people. Seems like a fair trade-off to me.
Comments
It makes you wonder about the future of illegal immigration when factories close up shops in MEXICO in favor of the Phillipines....
(that's a helluva lot farther "swim"...)
This city will never "shut down" as long as we have one of our largest "employers" firmly entrenched...namely the welfare system.
B.G.
The sad fact of the matter is that if our representatives really listened to the majority of the American people, we would not have an illegal immigration problem.
The talking heads will tell you we cannot deport so many million people - not true. No one that I know of has done a definitive study to see if this is even impossible
I actually think that if all of the illegal immigrants in Fort Wayne were somehow magically deported overnight the City would most likely have a couple of days where things were very disorganized and there would be a lot of problems; but, we would get over it fairly quickly.
We need to enforce our existing immigration laws and we need to secure our borders. After this is done we should double legal immigration.
Mike Sylvester
Leo & Larry: Right on.
Mike: Slowly put down the Libertarian Party Kool-Aid, please. We most definitely should NOT double legal immigration.
We should drastically curtail legal immigration.
We already have enough environmental problems as it is with our existing population. Adding more people will only exacerbate such problems as sprawl, loss of farmland, fresh-water shortages, etc.
And as a recovering libertarian, let me quote Milton Friedman: "You cannot simultaneously have free immigration and a welfare state."
We have a welfare state. When you libertarians have managed to abolish it, get back with me about increasing immigration.
Seriously, the United States is not responsible for solving the social and economic ills of Mexico or of any other Third World country. The Third World's export of people to the West must stop. The Third World must be forced to solve their problems in ways other than foisting off their excess populations on the West.
I was going to write an editorial, but these past few months, I have been very busy. But I will make a few comments.
Steven Camarota is the Research Director for the Center of Immigration Studies. He spoke before a panel, which provides quantitative support against amnesty for illegal aliens as well as looking at increasing immigration.
There are four findings:
1. There are 65 million Americans with a high school education
2. 4 million are unemployed
3. 19 million have left the job market (no longer looking, the gave up)
4. The idea that there is no one there to fill a job is just plain wrong
Between 2000 and 2005 with a high school education; Saw unemployment increased by 1 million. Saw those not looking increased by 1.5 million. Those who did not complete high school saw their percentage holding a job decrease from 59% to 56%. Those with a high school education saw their percentage holding a job decrease from 78% to 75%.
The economic recovery has not helped these less educated workers, why? The idea that Americans will not perform jobs is just plain wrong. Occupations with highest immigrant participation have 22 million Americans in the same occupations. There are 14 million less educated Americans in heavily immigrant occupations. If there were jobs that Americans would not perform, then there would be few Americans in these occupations. In the highest concentration of immigrant occupations there are 1.7 million Americans unemployed. The Department of Labor and Commerce track 473 specific occupations to divide the economy. The number of immigrants counted represent 100% of legal and 90% of illegal workers. There was no majority occupation that immigrants do that Americans do not. If there were, it would show up as 80% to 90% of an occupation being immigrant. There are 35 occupations where immigrants make up nearly 1/3 of the workers but these occupations represent just 7% of the total U.S. Workforce. These 35 occupations have 5 million Americans employed.
No matter how many people smuggle heroin into America, that mob of felons will never be redefined as a legal mass migration. Yet this is the kind of argument we get from those who wish in vain that all you have to do to legalize something is to ignore that law long enough, to last a long enough time without getting caught -- and then point to all that water under the bridge as if it validated anything at all.
The only thing that a large backlog of unprosecuted lawbreakers gets you is a lot of catch-up work in the halls of justice -- and a lot of well-deserved turnover at election time.
I have yet to see the paragraph anywhere in local, state or federal law that stipulates that any individual, in any position low or high, can rise above a law if only you look the other way long enough.
Conspirators who ignore the law for a long time often are outraged when they finally come to the attention of law enforcement and the earned penalties loom large, but that has never been a defense in court for you and me, and we have the vote.
If you want to defy a law without cost, you have to repeal it first. That's just procedure. Nobody is above the law -- even when it a takes quite a while for the law to catch up with a whole lot of lawbreakers. That's why a law & order society like ours works. Equal justice.
If we break the law, we know we'll spend the rest of our lives looking over our shoulder until justice finds us. It's why crime doesn't pay.
If the country wants to make a lion-sized exception for an entire culture of illegal aliens, fine, but the nation has to change the law first, not just for Mexicans (since that would be profiling), but for every foreigner that slides under a rusty fence.
People who want to decriminalize illegal aliens in general have to account for those pesky nuts and bolts. There are no shortcuts, and that is really what this is all about.
>People who want to decriminalize illegal
>aliens have to account for those pesky
>...shortcuts -- and that is really
>what this (argument) is all about...
People might as well stop pretending that they have to have a fundamental acquaintance with operations or foreign communiques before they can decypher top-level international secret messages.
I use those words believing that the actual line drawn to maintain secrets and protect matters relating to future counter-operations is perfectly well inscribed.
bla bla bla.
either enforce the laws on the books, as the politicians, judges, cops, are required by oath to do; and on their way out, give the illegals a nice note on their deprotation papers that they are welcome to return legally. The illegal alien murderers, rapists, child molesters, and other criminals and fugitives from foreigh justice, lock 'em up, and ship them back to their respective authorities.
Then shut down the businesses that are breaking the laws , by evading taxes, withholding, paying ucash under the table. etc., and charge them with the respective crimes, and lock them up too.
Then close the banks that are illegally wiring frauduelently the money laundered through these illegal businessess too.
Sure- we send criminals up the river for botching a 7-11 stickup for a few undred dollars, if that,
but the white collar criminals- so-called legitimate repsectable businessmen, and "pillars of the community"- chamber of commerce members, better business members,
fine upstanding corporate citizens-
well, we turn a blind eye to justice, and pretty much let them run roughshod over the laws of the land, and the constitution.
I am sick of hearing "we are a nation of laws, and without them, we are on the slippery slope to anarchy, chaos, and totalitarianism.
well, by not upholding the laws of the land, these white collar corporate criminals, and dare I say REPUBLICANS mostly, are making a mockery of the United states of america, and the principles of freedom, liberty, and democracy that our veterans shed precious blood for, and the rest of us spent precious money on, all so
the rich can ignore the laws, and do whatever, in the name of ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT; while we fill our prisons with the poor, for "mickey mouse misdemeanors"?
I think not.
Deport all illegals, because they are breaking the laws. who knows- your son or daughter might actually be able to find a job, once we have opened up those 12 million jobs, currently held illegally.
Americans wont work them? then put the baby rapers, and granny muggers, and the other detritus waiting to "reenter society through the courts" . at least they will be employed LEGALLY, and PAYING TAXES, and their employers WONT BE BREAKING THE LAWS..
DUH! what part of illegal dont you people understand? the law is the law. period. dont like it? move. or change it. that is the choices we all have in this, the LEAST SCREWED UP NATION IN THE WORLD...
and as a rebuttal, to our resident rocket scientist, Mr. Larsen.
I agree that the more you know, the smarter you are.
but intelligence doesnt come only from a book, and education doesnt only come from an institution of higher learning,.
In fact, the real secret to intellect, and erudition (look that up) is to take whatever the heck he just said, deep that it may be, factually perfect though it may sound, and put it in terms that your respective audience may be able to understand.
by that I mean- an educated, intelligent erudite man, may possess a great deal of wisdom, knowledge, or common sense(of which I've found the 3 are usually mutually exclusiev in any given individual)
but if you cant explain it in terms that the common person, of average intellect can understand, than you might as well be talking gibberish to mush heads, because it will get you the same results in next weeks
General economic policy test, or whatever.
And if an average citizen has to work 4 full time jobs, at sub standard wages, for no benefits such as paid tuition, or health care, than all the formal institutionalized education wont amount to a hill of beans, because 1. when will he/she find time between the 4 jobs to study, or much less attend lectures from "pointy heads in the first place? 2. whe will they be able to fidn time to study between flipping burgers, making fires, pouring pepsi's;
and then taking care of their families, and all the normal things we lesser "uber-humans have to do
3. when the 4 jobs we're working barely pay the bills, how do we afford the outrageous books and tuition required to earn tha t piece of paper that states we can parrot back all the fairy tales we just paid a fortune to "learn".
4,. and if we cant find a ny jobs, because they are all shipped oversees, outsourced, downsized, ro taken up by "illegals who are only doing the jobs we American middle class white people who have our birthrights as americans to deserve- say "rocket scientists/ engineers, mathematicians, physicists, ets;
then how are we suppose to find the money to buy our way to a better way of life, by spending, or borrowing thousnads of dollars of debt to pay the educational extortion for tuition, books, misc, fees, etc?
So For someone allegedly eruditeas youself, it certainly seems to me you are lacking a lot of common sense.
maybe your highly developed intellect needs a few beers, to dumb yourself down to the level of the rest of us.
By the way, Mr. Larsen- at least you would be a better congress man than that "ijit" we have there now. good luck, my friend, and fun sparring with you..
And as a final 'coup de gras' to this flight of fancies, let's all call the I.R.S. and ask them if ignoring the law long enough will eventually relieve one of the obligation to settle accounts in accordance with that law.
Anybody who finds the I.R.S. confirming the notion that less-than-vigorous investigation, auditing, or enforcement on their part vacates a law and relieves us of responsibility to adhere to it -- please publish the news on this board! Right under the late bulletin revealing that pigs are now flying.