Question Of The Week, 8/28/05
I found this Newsday.com article while I was trying to come up with this weeks question. I feel most United States citizens think something needs to be done about our lax immigration policy and our wide open borders. Two Arizona politicians have come up with plans (mentioned in the article) to solve the problem. So, this weeks Question Of The Week is, Would you be more likely to support the plan offered by Sen. Jon Kyl or the bill that was sponsored by Senators Kennedy and McCain? I'll post my answer in the comment section Monday.
God Bless America, God Save The Republic.
God Bless America, God Save The Republic.
posted by David Schantz | 2:31 AM
13 Comments:
I think this is a major problem for America but I don't think I can support either plan at this time. I think we need to end welfare to any one wanting to enter the country and slowly end welfare for everyone else, make sure all people crossing the border do not have diseases and are not terrorists but I also see the need to make it easier to become a citizen or work in the united states.
I cannot support either plan: Kyl's is impractical (Illegals will not turn themselves in, only to be deported), and Kennedy/McCain's rewards illegal immigration. Also, knowing the lack of thoroughness on the part of federal investigators, I believe that visas will be granted willy-nilly and thereby admit undesirables (those with diseases, criminals, and possibly even terrorists).
Why has the problem with illegal immigration mushroomed? One factor, I beleve, is all the taxpayer-funded freebies they can get. It used to be that illegals were very careful to avoid trouble here in the States and also could not get jobs other than those of maid, gardener, or migrant worker. Now construction companis are picking up workers (illegal and legal) from gather spots outside convenience stores. Such loitering used to be against the law, and local authorities made the arrests.
My husband, who hails from Southern California, has more extreme proposals: (1) Annex Mexico, or (2) Put up a wall to secure our southern border.
Somehow, we have got to make it more unpleasant for illegals to be here: arrests, sting operations, severe penalties for employers who hire illegals, etc. Presently, the burden and costs of illegals is quite high, if one takes into account medical issues, education of their children, lost payroll taxes, public safety--to name a few. I feel that these costs more than offset any advantages from the cheap labor which illegals provide.
Now this is a sticky situtaion. We are dealing with real people and have direct effect on their lives. That being said, we need to send illegal immigrants back to Mexico. We already had a amnesty period when Reagan was president. Looks like it wholly stopped that problem.
If I had to take on plan, I would lean towards McCain/Kennedy, although the number is way too high. I agree with Kyl's plan, but it is impratical to actually have illegals turn themselves in.
But here is the thing I must stress, whatever plan we take; amnesty, exportaion, or a combination thereof, afterwards we must take steps to not allow it to happen again,
I heard one pundit mention adding a second fence several yards from the first, that would allow an area of nowhere space where patrolling border officers would be more than likely to capture them. Hey, it's a start.
Both proposals appease and encourage law-breakers. I have no problem with people who immigrate to the US legally because in that process of legal immigration, they signal their willingness to obey the laws of the United States. People who come here illegally send the opposite signal. I am disgusted that the best our government can come up with is an “honor system” where these people will come forward and apply for “temporary visas.” How many times in the past 50 years has the United States offered amnesty to illegal immigrants? Has such appeasement worked? No.
Neither program is viable; it is politics as usual. What needs to happen is for the federal government to authorize states to address illegal immigration directly, and fund those efforts. Illegal aliens need to be rounded up and deported, and through a coordinated effort, our borders need to be sealed. Those who are subsequently caught illegally entering the US need to be punished in a way that discourages such conduct. Nothing short of this will work, either in the short or long term. Personally, I believe that we are devoid of politicians who have any moral courage whatsoever, so the problem of illegal immigration will be with us until the worst thing happens: a terrorist attack on the United States via our porous borders.
Documentation will help greatly the assessment of the problem, but is little solution itself. For this reason, I favor the plans to fine illegals, allowing them to apply for guest worker visas. While this does reward their heretofore illegal behavior, it seems the most pragmatic of beginnings. Mass deportation will most probably and sadly result in our government giving relief aid to Mexico. If we are compelled to solve the problem, then we may as well give some effort to solving it here. Deportations must happen, but can be made less massive by recognition (and fining) of those that would be legal if they could.
Neither plan has my support. These people are here in violation of the law. They need to be arrested and deported. Immediately. They carry disease, so let Health and Human Services take care of it. The government can do a lot more under a 'public health' cause of action than it can under an 'illegal immigration' cause of action.
Also, we need to change the law so that if you are born to illegal immigrants, you are not a citizen. (Exception: if you can only communicate in English, you can stay because it would be cruel to deport such a person).
It doesn't look like either plan will get much support here, I think both of these plans are rewards for entering our country illegally. To get my support a plan would have to put more people on the border (military?)to stop anyone from entering illegally. If an illegal alien is arrested for commiting another crime they should be denied bail. After they finish their sentence they should be transported back across the border. Any person or business that hires illegal aliens should be hit with a serious fine, lets say $75,000 per illegal alien found working for them.That would be for a first offense, the fines should be increased for repeat offenders. The money would go right back into the program to secure our borders, pay roll for border security and transportation fees for getting deportees back to the border and out of the country.
I'm thinking immigration and border security could turn out to be one of the top issues in the next presidential campaign.
God Bless America, God Save The Republic
I think immigration policy is something that you can't just address in a discussion like this based off of one AP article.
To first address the point the question asks, I would wholeheartedly side with the McCain-Kennedy bill.
I live in Iowa, a state where we see large amounts of Mexican and Latin American immigration. But if you go anywhere in the world right now, immigration has increased massively because of the ever-emerging phenomena and reality of globalization.
Most of the comments I see here don't address any of the economic concerns that are legitimately brought up by business and economists: if we decide to deport all of the millions of illegal immigrants, we will lose hundreds of thousands of jobs that, unfortunately, most Americans won't take.
In this age of international trade and interdependence, we can't rely on nationalistic isolationism, we have to actually engage the international community, particularly our southern neighbors, with trade policies and immigration policies that substantially increase the quality of life for these people as well as make legal immigration the easy step that it should be.
Granted, we do need better border security for multiple reasons, but exporting illegal Mexican immigrants to protect us against terrorism is about the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Name me one Mexican terrorist affiliated with al-Qaeda or Islamic fundamentalism and maybe then we can have a real debate.
Amnesty for those illegal immigrants already employed in this country is the only real option we've got.
The other sentimentality I'm hearing on this discussion is that welfare has something to do with it. It does not. If our trade policies with Central and Latin America actually worked and were beneficial to someone other than large corporations, we probably wouldn't have such a problem.
Finally, to specifically address some points in David's comment, seeing as that's the most recent one, there are already substantial fines for the hiring of illegal workers without the appropriate work visas or other considerations. However, the cheap wages they pay them and the actual productivity and revenue they get from their hard work covers the fine plus even more.
Secondly, we can't put the military on the borders for the most part because of posse comitatus. Sure, there are ways around it, but border patrol agents and the National Guard are the forces you'd want to use.
As for 2008, immigration policy will undoubtedly be a critical component on the platform for both parties.
I'd favor Jon Kyl's bill over the McCain/Kennedy bill. Kyl's works to improve control of the border whereas the other one just gives the illegals a 'pass' to keep doing it.
IMHO, the illegals here should have to EARN the green card and EARN the right to be an American citizen because the U.S. is a nation of LAWS and lawbreaking should not be rewarded...
Mad Mikey
http://madmikey.mu.nu
McCaine and Kennedy? I really don't like either of those names, especially together. Anything Kennedy thinks of will most likely suck.
I too like neither plan-
I wrote about immigration enforcement and reform back in February-
Here is the link to my essay:
http://4commonsensenow.blogspot.com/2005/02/line-in-sand.html
It is a problem that can be solved if integrity and Common Sense are applied.
The answer is simple...make a couple announcements:
1 - that all illegal aliens who are working in the USA will need to have a work VISA or be deported.
2 - in three months the border with Mexico will be closed and only those people with work VISA's will be allowed in.
Of course we will need to expand the agency which processes work VISA's, enhance/upgrade/create a/the system to search criminal databases in all 50 states.
The economy will take a hit, but we will recover.
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