Sorry I'm late and that I don't have time to read the previous 80 pages. Just wanted to add some thoughts, to the original topic.
1. Deporting 12 million people isn't going to happen. Too hard, too expensive and too inhumane.
2. Guest worker programs are disastrous and can only have the effect of creating a 2-tiered class system. One hard working man who saves his dough to start a business should have every opportunity as the next (In case you've forgotten; that's why this country is great).
3. Punishing employers who hire illegals will create more, rather than solve, problems. Right now; poor, hungry people who long for a better lot in life for their families cross the border of the relatively rich country to their North and bust their a$$es to achieve it. Anyone who thinks poor, hungry people will stop crossing the border of the relatively rich country to their North because they can't get a legal job is fooling himself or herself. I would. Crime pays too, in case you're unaware of it. Take a look at any poor hungry demographic in this country and compare the crime statistics. I'd rather they work for their money.
4. Our current rate of reproduction means our expected tax-base is pretty severely outmatched by the impending entitlements of baby-boomers. Taxes on immigrants, both legal and illegal, can go a long way towards filling the gap. Most illegals have documents, whether they're real or not, and do pay taxes. Currently, an employer only needs record them and report their new hires
but not do anything overt to verify their authenticity.
5. Taking away the jobs, by cracking down on employers, without first establishing a solution for the 12 plus million people already here is a recipe for disaster (see paragraph 3.)
6. If you can't or won't get rid of those 12 million plus; the only decent thing to do is grant them amnesty
and citizenship. Unfair to those who've been waiting and playing by the rules? You bet
but there is no other solution whose negatives don't outweigh the positives. Such a solution would require a serious border fix
like the giant wall or some such thing
before it could really work.
7. While I'm not convinced the blind eye isn't the most reasonable solution (there's more than one reason it's been employed to date), I think a true solution would have to be too expensive, too inhumane, too unrealistic, with too many worse consequences
or a more radical solution will have to be developed. :wink:
Said solution, IMO, has to take away the incentive. I'd wager my kingdom anti-immigration laws will be about as effective as anti-drug laws. So, if we admit we can't do anything bad enough to offenders to take away the incentive (and I posit we can not), then it's time we look outside of the box
or in this case, our borders.
We know that the Mexicans come here for our money. We know that a healthy chunk of it gets sent home to Mexico. Probably a significant percentage of the Mexican GNP, I'd guess. Here is where our leverage
really is. How about if we put that economic pressure on the Mexican government to allow absentee voting from the Mexicans now living here in exchange for allowing that flow of money to continue. Even sweeten the offer with plans for even more to follow?
Next; we offer to annex the entire nation
including the right to migrate back and fourth to citizens of both nations as easily as Wisconsin to Illinois. In a methodical merger over the next generation or so; we enjoy the windfall of gold-rush like growth in the Mexican territory as American business races to take advantage of the beautiful country and lower wages, while Mexicans reap the rewards of same
without even leaving home. The initial incentive of receiving the monies they've come to expect in exchange for joint cooperation should provide a mighty incentive to the Mexican voting public, while energizing our own economy in unprecedented ways.
Such a merger would serve to the mutual benefit of us both. Perhaps a combination of some serious saber-rattling
like threatening to
really expel all of the illegals and actually build that wall, if no compromise can be arranged
along with the honest, contractual offer of economic equality. A locked up tight border would be devastating to Mexico
so it stands to reason that kind of saber-rattling combined with an offer of such windfall opportunity would be a tremendous incentive to the Mexican voting public. Or am I just dreaming outloud? I'd like to think not.
At the end of the day; I believe the sharing of opportunity
and the granting of a decent shot at a decent lot in life to individuals is the best solution to our problem, if indeed we have one. Opportunity is one of those rare commodities (like love) in that the more you give, the more you have. Our current isolationist position helps no one. Another Great Wall strikes me as ludicrous. Bigotry aside; what do we have to fear from Mexicans?
If it's really terrorism we're afraid of; why not assist them in beefing up their borders and Ports of entry? Take a peek at a map, if it helps. Next raise your hand if you think we have something to fear from Guatamala or Belize
or El Salvadore, Honduras or Nicaragua for that matter? Each of these borders are a fraction of the Mexican/United States border, anyway, and paradise is right below that.
Conclusion: Isolationism sucks. It benefits no one. F*ck worrying about closing the border. Open it.
