What should be done about illegal immigration?

Here is a Snopes piece about a CA high school at which students hung the USA flag upside down, and raised the Mexican flag. I find this very, very, troubling, and a harbinger of similar future acts.

http://www.snopes.com/photos/politics/mexicoflag.asp

The latest telephone poll taken by the Florida Governor's
office asked whether people who live in Florida think
illegal immigration is a serious problem.

29 percent of respondents answered: "Yes, it is a serious
problem."

71 percent of respondents answered: "No es una problema
seriosa."

That's cute.

Amnesty is a terrible idea. It is especially terrible in this time of high, and growing, unemployment.


Standing Up To The Irrational: Can Obama Do It On Immigration? (strange Munoz utterings)


By Roy Beck, Thursday, April 9, 2009, 11:06 PM

“It just doesn’t seem rational," is how I was quoted in today's New York Times front page story about Pres. Obama supposedly being committed to moving a mass amnesty forward this year. So, for about the next 12 hours, I answered phone calls from print reporters and did radio shows across the country.

Despite the Times' very difficult financial position and the hatred it evokes from a sizable part of the public, you can quickly understand its continuing power over the nation's media when you are quoted in one of its controversial stories.

Every time it happens to me, my phone literally is ringing all day long from reporters, talk hosts, bloggers, researchers, foreign press, Hispanic press.

The New York Times still sets a lot of the agenda of the whole nation's news media.

What got things going today was Julia Preston's story that quoted a "senior administration official" under the headline:

Obama to Push Immigration Bill as One Priority
By the end of the day, nearly every open-borders group in America had sent out mass emails declaring victory and calling on their members to call the White House to tell them not to listen to the protests from groups like NumbersUSA.

Part of their excitement, no doubt, was that one of their own was the "senior administration official" delivering the pro-amnesty news. Cecilia Muñoz, deputy assistant to the president and director of intergovernmental affairs in the White House, was until recently a vice president of the National Council of La Raza

Reporter Preston clearly understood that the chief problem with Munoz's pro-amnesty comments was how they played against the nation's terrible unemployment problem. She wrote this:

Opponents of legalization legislation were incredulous at the idea that Mr. Obama would take on immigration when economic pain for Americans is so widespread.

“It just doesn’t seem rational that any political leader would say, let’s give millions of foreign workers permanent access to U.S. jobs when we have millions of Americans looking for jobs,” said Roy Beck, executive director of NumbersUSA, a group that favors reduced immigration. Mr. Beck predicted that Mr. Obama would face “an explosion” if he proceeded this year.

“It’s going to be, ‘You’re letting them keep that job, when I could have that job,’ ” he said.

In all my interviews today, I talked about two numbers that illustrate starkly the irrationality -- and callousness -- of any move toward an amnesty this year.

6 million -- That is the estimate of illegal aliens who are holding down non-agricultural jobs in the U.S. Most of them are working in manufacturing, service and construction jobs that require no more than a high school education.
Nearly 7 million -- That is the number of Americans with no more than a high school education who are looking for jobs (primarily in manufacturing, service and construction) but can't find one.
Cecilia Munoz is suggesting that her boss, Pres. Obama, thinks it is a good idea to tell those 7 million unemployed Americans that the jobs they want should continue to be occupied (permanently) by 6 million illegal foreign workers!

I'm hoping that is not Mr. Obama's idea at all but what we were seeing was the result of Munoz drawing the short trial balloon and being the one who had to publicly float it to see if the American public is distracted enough not to notice what a crazy idea that would be.

But Cecilia wasn't the only one trying to sell nonsense. Reporter Preston quotes other Administration officials as saying that . . .

. . . Mr. Obama’s plan would not add new workers to the American work force, but that it would recognize millions of illegal immigrants who have already been working here.
That is another trial balloon to see if the public believes that illegal immigration is a victimless crime. Every manufacturing, service and construction job an illegal alien is allowed to keep tends to mean that an American stays unemployed. Now that sounds like a good campaign theme for congressional re-elections.

Of course, maybe I was floating a trial balloon myself in talking about "an explosion" if Pres. Obama pushes an amnesty this year. I am depending on Americans to stand up for themselves and speak up. We certainly will give everybody a chance to do so through our Action Buffet system. If you haven't told the White House what you think of Cecilia Munoz's comments this week, please do so now.

Cecilia says Mr. Obama will speak to the nation about his amnesty plans in May and then will bring "immigration groups" and other experts together during the summer to hammer out a plan.

But the Times story details no promise of bringing the amnesty to a vote this year.

I think the White House is waiting to judge the public's reactions to the amnesty efforts before committing itself. If Americans sit on their hands every time a White House Official says something irrational about immigration, then the irrational may start to seem rational.

Looks like Mr. Obama may be depending on you to help him stand up to the irrational open-borders groups.

I also believe amnesty is a bad idea because it means those who have tried to come to our country legally gets pushed back.

No, it doesn't. There is no reason to believe those who have been following the rules will be pushed back in any way, shape, or form.

If I wait a week to get a package in the mail; it matters not at all if 10 or 10 million packages were delivered to others sooner. A week is a week, regardless.

Are you sure about that? How?

True, but you simply can't load up twelve million people in boxcars and ship them south. You can't. Best bet now is to strengthen the border, improve the legal routes, and work towards something like the old McCain/Kennedy bill.

I agree with roger (although I get to the conclusion through a different route).

It seems like every sane person on both sides has ended up with the same conclusion. You pass legislation that includes border security, reform of legal immigration routes and a path to citizenship. This was the basic idea of McCain/Kennedy which had majority support in both houses of Congress and had to be defeated by filibuster (and this was before the Democrats controlled everything).

We know the eventual result of all this fighting. We also know that waiting doesn't help. There is no evidence that getting rid of millions of workers is a good thing in a downturn and whatever the economy, legalizing workers that are here anyway is a good thing (legal worker get better wages).

The question is how to get there. Taking the bigotry out of the equation-- or at least marginalizing it-- is the key to moving forward to what at least two thirds of us already know is the best compromise solution.

If we crack down on employers of illegals, the latter will self-deport.

Some would leave, sure. But some would turn to crime, as some poor oppressed people always have. More importantly; children would go hungry, but you don't seem to care about brown children going hungry. Fortunately, the majority of Americans do.

On the other hand; Amnesty would help the children (which is the primary concern of decent people) AND eliminate the "illegal" from the term illegal immigrant. Anyone who was honest about their objection being of a legal nature would embrace a comprehensive solution that provided such an enormous reduction in crime. Your solution, on the other hand, could only serve to encourage more and worse criminal behavior from the very people you fear most. That makes no more sense from a legal standpoint than it does from a humane perspective.

This is what happens when one starts with a faulty conclusion, and then tries desperately to fortify it with reasoning. When one examines all of these factors first; Amnesty is obviously the most logical conclusion.

roger, If there is a way to make it legal by not giving illegals first debs on citizenship against those who are trying to become "legal" is okay.

I just haven't seen anything in writing about this procedural amnesty program.

There is a way to get rid of illegal immigrants; make sure the laws are enforced taking away jobs from illegals. Making it not worth hiring them for employers. They will leave on their own. Say a $100,000 fine for each illegal hired. They will disappear very quickly.

Agreed 100% ci. Its called enforcing the law. It does not require shipping them home, rounding them up. They will mostly go back home and apply for legal citizenship the right way, if they care about obeying the law.

Is it actually possible to have the reasonable discussion of the issues indicated by the last few posts? I hope so...

First, the issue that many people don't acknowledge is that illegal people are human beings. They have lots of reasons for staying here beyond work.

People have family connections and community connections. There are illegal people who have grown up in the US since a very young age who would be completely lost in any other country (and some don't even know any language other than English). Illegal people are, in fact, people. As human beings we all know that making life decisions impacting is often more complex than work.

There are several of problems with the "punish the employers" tactic.

First, as noted, putting harsh pressure on vulnerable families probably won't have the "desired" effect. Imagine what it would take to get you to leave the US-- would taking away your livelihood and ability to get services get you to leave?

Second, there are lots of Americans (do-gooders from civil rights groups to churches to simply kind people) who wouldn't put up with their neighbor's suffering. The number of Americans, from citizens to elected officials to law enforcement organizations, who are supporting sanctuary laws in their city is a good indication of the problem. This is, of course, a particular problem in a democratic society where each citizen gets a vote... if you can't make the provisions harsh enough (and you can't because too many voters are sympathetic), they don't have a chance of working. (OK this second point isn't really part of the "punish the employers" theme, but...)

Third, employers aren't going to take it. It is stupid enough to think that eliminating currently productive workers in a struggling economy is a good idea. The idea that raising costs and legal burdens on employers is simply ridiculous.

Of course employers have financial resources which gives them more political clout than the average citizen. This is why no one really takes the "punish the employer" thing very seriously. It is much easier to support racial profiling and raids on workers and idiot get-tough sheriffs.

The "pro-enforcement" fad started by the Bush Administration has done very little damage to employers. It has been very effective at breaking families and enraging communities.

This is not true. If they go back home-- they are not allowed to apply for legal citizenship. If you leave the US, you are barred from re-entry under any circumstance-- either for 10 years, or for life depending on how long you were here (yes people with more ties to the US get kept out longer).

This was part of the get tough on immigrants legislation in the 1980s. The net result was that migrant workers stopped returning home.

Of course there is also the issue that if you are not wealthy, the chance of you getting in legally is pretty near zero anyway.

That is, by very far, the most idiotic statement ever to appear on this thread. Incredible.

The 'it is physically impossible to round up and deport 12 to 20 million people' argument is the canard the pro-amnesty folks most like to use. A close second is the persistent catcalls of racism and bigotry and the absolutely assinine accusations of 'wanting to starve brown children.' Or if we don't take them in, they'll turn to crime. That stupid argument should be dispelled by an even cursory scanning of history of times in our not so distant past when there was far more poverty and far less crime.

So rounding them all up and deporting them is the only alternative to amnesty? Really? Does any thinking person seriously look it that way? How blind does one have to be to fail to see the practical solutions that would simply make it unpleasant and unprofitable to be here illegally so that the 'good' people would no longer want to stay. We could even provide a short period of amnesty to allow them to get their affairs in order and do that. Then it wouldn't be as daunting a task to round up the thugs and scoundrels and deal with them.

Racist and bigoted? We've had that discussion ad nauseum and its pretty hard to make that argument when so many brown people are good, hard working American citizens and value our Constitution and law just like all good, hard working American citizens should and THEY oppose amnesty.

Feeding starving children? By all means lets do that. I am devoting a measure of my time and personal resources to do just that. But feed them where they are. Don't bring them here and put them into a welfare system that will likely marginalize them and distort their values for life as well as teaching them that it is okay and profitable to break the law. You care about kids? Just look at what our current welfare system has done to kids. When those liberal wackos start emptying their own wallets and spending their own time and resources to extend mercy, then they can presume to judge the rest of us.

In the process of enforcing the law we also need to work on sensible, practical, and enforceable short term work permits along with a more streamlined and efficient path to citizenship for those who want to become Americans. But we should never condone making breaking the law the most effective way to gain a path to citizenship.

To see why this is patently absurd, consider that these millions of people never got "rounded up and IMPORTED". Spain has a novel approach, which is "$1,000 and free ticket back home" to anyone in the country illegally who volunteers. Even if the US total is 20 million people (a.k.a. "human beings" for the lexicographically impaired among us) that would only cost $20billion and save easily 10 times as much in current and future benefits and other taxpayer-funded transfer payments.

Nonsense. Ebrown's point is spot on. One cannot endorse "starving them out" plans, including children who have done NOTHING wrong, while considering that they too are human beings.

Only those who've successfully demonized the illegal immigrants in their own mind, to the point of considering them somewhat less than human, can think starving a man's children... is an acceptable strategy. It is obscene... plain and simple.

One either hasn't considered the ramifications of such a plan, or he simply doesn't care about the effect it has on the brown man's children.