Tag: illegal-immigration

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Amnesty Idiocy

The latest likely-to-get-signed-by-The-Decider-in-Chief border “reform” package looks likely to pass the House and Senate, a proposition that has conservatives and many libertarians hopping mad. Lest we be too quick to judge our Congresscritters, though, Rick Moran points out that we should have sympathy for them, since we’re dealing with a whole other species:

Reading and listening to politicians talk about their Comprehensive Immigration Reform bill is an interesting anthropological exercise. Being a separate species of human, Homo Politicus exhibits all the characteristics one might expect from a breed apart.
The ability to talk out of both sides of the mouth at the same time is highly prized in Politicus although evolution has given the genus a forked tongue and a larger mouth to go along with this ability. This tends to force the nose to get out of joint on a regular basis which can be a hazard to the beast’s health considering all the hot air generated by an increased lung capacity. This tends to crowd the heart in the chest cavity, making that organ much smaller than ours. But evolution once again comes to the rescue as not only does Politicus have engorged bile ducts (a necessity given how much of that precious fluid they generate on a regular basis) but also a massive bladder – all the better to piss on the rest of us whenever they get the chance.
Many of these unusual attributes have been on display as Politicus has been busy trying to justify its sellout of the United States on immigration to a bored, cynical public who doesn’t believe half of what it hears and is depressed and discouraged by listening to the other half[.]

Ouch.

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Go Go Dunkin Donuts!

Hey, whaddya know? A national employer is looking to get on the right side of the immigration debate! Dunkin Donuts is mandating that all of its franchises immediately begin culling employees who are not of legal status and checking all future hires against the Federal databases made available for just such a purpose. This move, of course, has raised some hackles. Good. Let “immigrant advocates” squeal – these sorts of steps are long overdue and welcome ones.
As for me, I think I’ll be dropping a few more coins into DD’s coffers for their trouble.

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An Opportunity Missed

Jobs Americans won't do.
White House sources are reporting that Fox News anchor/syndicated radio host Tony Snow is in the final stages of talks to become the new Press Secretary for the Bush Administration. President Bush has missed a real opportunity here to practice what he preaches, in that he could have extended an offer to become P.S. to one of the millions of “undocumented workers” flowing across our southern border. After all, it really is a “job [sane] Americans won’t do”.
h/t to Aron for the lunchtime Gimp/blog inspiration.

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Krauthammer Nails The Conservative Concerns On Immigration

Charles Krauthammer has written a piece that, to my mind, accurately encapsulates the set of conservative objections and views on the ongoing immigration debate. From
First a Wall — Then Amnesty:

Forget employer sanctions. Build a barrier. It is simply ridiculous to say it cannot be done. If one fence won’t do it, then build a second 100 yards behind it. And then build a road for patrols in between. Put cameras. Put sensors. Put out lots of patrols.
Can’t be done? Israel’s border fence has been extraordinarily successful in keeping out potential infiltrators who are far more determined than mere immigrants. Nor have very many North Koreans crossed into South Korea in the last 50 years.
Of course it will be ugly. So are the concrete barriers to keep truck bombs from driving into the White House. But sometimes necessity trumps aesthetics. And don’t tell me that this is our Berlin Wall. When you build a wall to keep people in, that’s a prison. When you build a wall to keep people out, that’s an expression of sovereignty. The fence around your house is a perfectly legitimate expression of your desire to control who comes into your house to eat, sleep and use the facilities. It imprisons no one.
Of course, no barrier will be foolproof. But it doesn’t have to be. It simply has to reduce the river of illegals to a manageable trickle. Once we can do that, everything becomes possible — most especially, humanizing the situation of our 11 million existing illegals.

Emphasis mine.
This is precisely the crux of the issue as I see it. All “reforms” will be useless or worse than useless until we take measured steps to actually control our border. Once we stem the tide, we can begin to truly work on the problem of those already here.

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Ouch. Very Ouch, Baby.

Tammy Bruce really let John McCain have it today. From “John McCain Thinks Americans Are French”:

Let me be blunt. McCain is a self-serving, opportunistic pig. He, like other open-borders, Americans-Are-Lazy politicians, is a man who has grown soft and fat and elitist in Washington, DC, and has developed an obvious contempt for the average working American. Not only does he not deserve to even think about being president, he should not be in the U.S. senate. He is an example of the opportunistic narcissists in Washington whose only concern is their own career as they do whatever they think it’ll take to advance themselves.

Wowsers. Read the whole thing, and then contact the good Senator’s office and see if he’s in any need of Bactine to assist in recovery from such a vicious tongue-lashing.

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The Onion Weighs In On Illegal Immigration

Illegal wrestlers crossing the border.Whether you agree or disagree with The Onion‘s overall politics (left-of-center, for the most part), there is no denying the writers behind its stories posess rare talent for distilling issues into their most basic, ridiculous forms. Take, for instance, an article from this week’s “issue”: WWE: Illegal Mexican Wrestlers Taking Smackdowns American Wrestlers Don’t Want. From the article:

The wrestlers, also known as “jobbers,” come in search of greater title opportunities and more interesting storylines than those available in their small, unorganized Lucha Libre leagues.
“These masked luchadores are hard-working, energetic, and always willing to learn new skills that Americans consider beneath them—such as being power-bombed from the top turnbuckle or chokeslammed through the announcer’s booth,” said McMahon on this week’s WWE Raw.
“The idea that these Mexicans are somehow stealing jobs from American wrestlers is ridiculous,”McMahon said.
“After all, someone’s got to take these folding chairs to the face.” McMahon then picked up a folding chair and whacked Rey Mysterio Jr. in the face.

Heh. Go ye and read the whole thing, for verily, it is good.

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Best Immigration Metaphor Yet

While many patriotic Americans have been distracted recently by the utter disrespect to America and its flag shown by hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, we have been missing out on an important part of the debate, a part which Gerard Van der Leun succinctly and astutely lays out in a remarkable piece:

I submit that America as The Big Pinata is what all this is about. It’s all it ever has been about. This Mexican flag over the American flag hung upside down (Distress!) simply takes our eye off the ball, or rather, the pinata. And since pinatas are normally approached blindfolded, that’s not surprising.
The kids above know, even if it is unconsciously, that the pinata is what is at stake here. What illegals from Mexico and every other country want most is unlimited chances to step over the line and take another swing at The Big Pinata. To date our border reality, if not our policy, enables that.
Those Americans who would like to think that there really is a border want the number of chances to take a swing cut back to somewhere below absolute zero. Those Americans who are consumed with the notion that self-esteem is more important than security favor unlimited swings along with policies that feed, clothe, medicate, and otherwise care for those ‘wretched masses yearning to get the Big Pinata jackpot.’

Go ye and read the whole thing, for it is good.

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Haw.

A caller to Rush Limbaugh’s program today just identified himself as an “undocumented Border Patrol agent”, i.e. a part of the “Minuteman Project”.
Heh. Linguistic turnabout’s fair play.

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From The “What Were They Thinking?” Files

If you managed to catch any of the coverage of the pro-illegal-immigrant rallies held over the weekend, you more than likely noted the presence of extreme numbers of Mexican flags and banners carrying slogans like “We demand equality!” and “This is stolen land.” Paul Cella over at RedState penned a rather remarkable response to the whole affair:

One of the strongest arguments for a generous immigration regime is the appeal to sentiment that is often captured in that tiresome catchphrase that we are “a nation of immigrants.” Most Americans, I wager, have some basic sympathy for this sentiment, as also for the aspiration that motivates so many people to come here to work. I know I do, and I am as firm an opponent of mass immigration as you will find. But it is not easy to see how this past weekend’s direct action appeals will facilitate this sentiment. Some asseverate, indeed, that the magnitude of the demonstrations in cities all over the country will put to rest what they call the nativist faction. I find this prediction very difficult to credit. Direct action by illegal immigrants, organized by the activists who would make them their instruments, seems a strategy calculated to inflame and polarize. American moderates, like Glenn Reynolds, who are generally kindly disposed to immigration, will be much less kindly disposed toward a illegal-immigrant interest group, organized and militant, of the kind that is presaged by this latest development.

Go and read the whole thing.
One commenter very assiduously notes: “What this weekend demonstrated to me is not people who want to live in America, but people who want to live in a prosperous Mexico.” Bingo. And continued coverage of such rallies can only assure yet-stricter immigration control policies.

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Solving Illegal Immigration: Can It Really Be THAT Difficult?

Like many of my ideological brethren, I’m a dedicated supply-sider, so the solution to our current illegal immigration crisis seems obvious to me: punish the companies that employ illegal immigrants.
Let me take a step back. I believe there are three parties primarily to blame for the current mess: the Mexican government, the US government and US employers. (There’s a second tier of blame that needs to be assigned to the illegal immigrants themselves, but I hold the enablers of their illegal behavior more responsible for the macro problem). The Mexican gov’t has made it their official policy to ferry the lower classes northward across our border, while the US gov’t has deemed it politically impossible to do anything substantive about it. US employers, meanwhile, seem to view illegal immigrants as a cost-cutting measure and employ them accordingly. We, the people of the US, have little-to-no ability to affect the Mexican gov’t’s policies, but we do have that ability with our own gov’t. We can also directly affect the businesses themselves, primarily by means of being careful consumers and directing our dollars to companies that don’t break the law.
My solution is three-fold and quite simple, really:

  1. Either mandate that any job in the US must be paid minimum wage or eliminate it (the minimum wage) entirely. The reason employers hire illegals is that, by dint of their situation, the immigrants are hardly in a position to complain to the authorities if they’re ill-treated or underpaid, thus the employers can get away with paying them far less than a legit American citizen.
  2. If illegal immigrants are being underpaid or mistreated by their employers, allow them a single shot at our legal system. Let them sue their employers for a sizeable, dare I say punitiveamount. Ensure them that they may remain in the US for as long as their civil trial takes, but as soon as they collect their jury award, they must immediately return to Mexico, where they can live like kings off the winnings.
  3. If employers are caught using illegal immigrants as workers, they should be fined double the amount of Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and Federal tax they would have paid per illegal worker used. If Wal*Mart would have owed say $2,000 per minimum wage employee for fiscal year 2005, then the Feds should collect $4,000 per head. States and localities should also get a crack at levying a double taxation on any such employers.

I think these solutions are eminently fair and in no way could possibly be construed as “anti-immigrant” or “racist”, which seems to be the Republicans’ primary concern in addressing immigration reform. This is completely pro-immigrant – we’re sticking up for the ill-treated illegals while at the same time protecting our national interests. Businesses already make a cost-benefit analysis when hiring illegals; obviously, it’s perceived as worth it for a significant portion of them at the moment. I want employers to see each and every illegal employee of theirs as a potentially damaging lawsuit. I want them to be terrified at the prospect of even accidentally hiring an illegal immigrant.
As for the whole “guest worker Visa” issue, I have one very simple solution: at no time shall they be available to anyone within the borders of the US. If you want a guest worker Visa, you have to return to your home nation, where a US consulate or embassy employee will be more than happy to help you obtain one.
Now if I could only find a couple of sponsors for just such a bill in Congress…