What should be done about illegal immigration?

Make illegals come here legally, they become proud citizens, and they will have wanted to become citizens, and we don't have people here just making some money to send back home.

Yes if it costs more, I am willing to pay it.

Self respect demands it and we should do it for the future and well being of the country.

How do I enforce the law.
No. 1, punish employers that illegally hire illegals, through the income tax system and other penalties. They will soon get the message after a few months.

No. 2, improve border security, and with fewer people trying to enter because of No. 1, it should become easier to manage.

No. 3, deal with illegals that are criminals in a better fashion, such as deporting them, and repeat offenders that return could be given stiffer penalties.

The details of No. 3 needs more study, but the No. 1 is my most important one, because if you dry up the demand,

...there will soon be much less desire to come here illegally. We need a good way to identify those people that do not have legal ids, after all - without that, how can an employer abide by all the right laws anyway? In other words, the government needs to provide a good way for employers to abide by the law.

We don't need to get real nasty with hard working illegals, and we can even provide free transportation back home and the best advice on how to apply for legal entry. If their work record is admirable, I would even consider giving them credit for that to expedite legal immigration, but for those that do not have the commendable record, no, they should be deported. I do not think deportation would be necessary for a great number at all. If we enforce No. 1, it would go a long way to improve the situation in a few months.

CalamityJane wrote:

Advocate wrote:

Dagmar, I think if the authorities harass the illegals and their employers enough, many illegals will leave on their own. This has happened to some extent.

What? Are you a minuteman or something? What on earth gives you or others the right to harass these poor people who only want to work here
and make some money to feed themselves.

They're human beings, just like you - with the exception that they have
less education than you, but far more class.

I guess you haven't been following this thread for any length of time. The illegals cause a lot of problems, such as driving down wages, displacing citizens in jobs, using up resources, costing taxpayers a great deal, etc. We already have 300 M people here, and don't need more, much less the dregs from other countries. Your attitude only brings in more illegals. Have you opened up your house to some of them?

Illegal immigration is an issue that, in my opinion, should have been a problem tackled soon after 911. I remember talking about closing our borders before the 911 attacks. We then learned after 911 that Middle Eastern men had been in our country taking flying lessons, intending to cause us harm, all right under our noses! Since then, the Homeland Security team has been assembled and the screening of any one coming into the US through our airports is a bit better, but our Southern border with Mexico is still wide open! This concerns me, because there has been increased terror activity to the south of the US ( Islam on march south of border ). This falls under Homeland Security and should be an issue President Bush should be tackling head on. This is the main reason Republicans and Democrats alike, should continue to press the Bush Administration to close the borders. I'm not against those who want to make a better life for themselves, but be realistic. In a post 911 world, we cannot afford to let just anyone come across the border.

If labor cost to much then jobs get exported to areas where there is cheap labor.

I guess your name calling is the result of not having any valid arguments.

Giving illegals amnesty eventually leads to citizenship, which results in them bringing in hordes of relatives, many of whom will take our money through welfare-type programs. Moreover, this encourages even more illegals, and the degradation continues.

CHINESE EXCLUSION. Nativists in the West singled out Chinese immigrants for violence and legalized discrimination, claiming that white wage-earners could never compete with "coolies" willing to live in squalor. The nativist Workingmen's Party led a movement for a new state constitution in 1878-79, which adopted provisions banning Chinese from employment by corporations or state government, segregating them into Chinatowns, and seeking to keep them from entering the state. One delegate to the constitutional convention summed up the prevailing mood: "This State should be a State for white men . . . We want no other race here." Under pressure from California and other Western states, Congress passed the nation's first wholesale immigration restriction, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.

okie wrote:

How do I enforce the law.
No. 1, punish employers that illegally hire illegals, through the income tax system and other penalties. They will soon get the message after a few months.

HOW? first you have to find out who is violating the law. Somehow I doubt that illegal immigrants and their employers will line up and fess up. If we're talking 7-20 million people, that's one heck of a task. And awfully costly. if it was that simple, it would have been implemented by now.

Quote:

No. 2, improve border security, and with fewer people trying to enter because of No. 1, it should become easier to manage.

Sure, that I agree with. Again, this will take years and billions of dollars. What until then?

Quote:

No. 3, deal with illegals that are criminals in a better fashion, such as deporting them, and repeat offenders that return could be given stiffer penalties.

The details of No. 3 needs more study, but the No. 1 is my most important one, because if you dry up the demand,

did you mean dry up the supply? you cannot dry up the demand. there is the need for unskilled workers... and the demand will remain whether you kick people out or not. except when you do, it will be an unmet demand and there would be shortages. not that it's likely to happen.

Quote:

...there will soon be much less desire to come here illegally. We need a good way to identify those people that do not have legal ids, after all - without that, how can an employer abide by all the right laws anyway? In other words, the government needs to provide a good way for employers to abide by the law.

We don't need to get real nasty with hard working illegals, and we can even provide free transportation back home and the best advice on how to apply for legal entry. If their work record is admirable, I would even consider giving them credit for that to expedite legal immigration, but for those that do not have the commendable record, no, they should be deported. I do not think deportation would be necessary for a great number at all. If we enforce No. 1, it would go a long way to improve the situation in a few months.

so now you're talking about legalization of most that are here. that is what i was saying and that is very different from your position before. but that (unless you change your mind again) i agree with... except, again, it will be near impossible to first identify all illegal aliens and second - to establish working record for them. more often than not, there is no record. your ideas are not bad in theory, but their implementation in practice is damn near impossible.

okie, it is not the large companies that hire illegal immigrants. they mostly cannot do that. there was an issue with walmart i think more than 10 years back, but it got a lot stricter since.

stop hiring the illegal immigrants and hire... who? many jobs would just be left unoccupied and people cannot afford that. can you imagine the consequences for this economy? once again, this is 7-20 million people, if we go by the number provided here.

legalizing those that work here - that's what i'm talking about, too. except i am telling you that it will not be possible to establish good or bad track record for illegal immigrants - track record simply does not exist.

By the way okie, I still would like to know who will work those jobs nobody else will work if we export all those illegals, what is it; 7 to 20 million?


With that many illegals in this country you had better learn to live with it.

xingu wrote:

By the way okie, I still would like to know who will work those jobs nobody else will work if we export all those illegals, what is it; 7 to 20 million?


With that many illegals in this country you had better learn to live with it.

Now there is a contradiction.
You say that the illegals are working at jobs that nobody else wants, yet many on the left claim there are no jobs because the economy is so bad.

If the economy is as bad as the left claims, then what jobs are the illegals doing?

not speaking english does not equal illegal..at my university we have many service people around who do not speak english, or barely. but they are legal. and unionized, might i add.

i do travel around, more than i like to, but, um, thanks for the suggestion, i guess. i just would not consider a meat packing plant a 'large company'. i presumed you meant national or multinational corporations. plus, my eyesight is not so good as to be able to tell at first sight who's illegal.

xingu wrote:

By the way okie, I still would like to know who will work those jobs nobody else will work if we export all those illegals, what is it; 7 to 20 million?


With that many illegals in this country you had better learn to live with it.

Now there is a contradiction.
You say that the illegals are working at jobs that nobody else wants, yet many on the left claim there are no jobs because the economy is so bad.

If the economy is as bad as the left claims, then what jobs are the illegals doing?