Revisiting immigration.

I've posted a few comments before on the subject and I thought that the following post deserved its own thread since I feel it will get buried where it is currently.

Respectfully submitted:

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Maestro/17

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Maestro/3

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Maestro/29 (another racist jumping on the anti-immigrant bandwagon; see below for the actual costs of deporting undocumented workers annually)

We are also seeing the backlash against immigrants, primarily Hispanic, in the guise of the ridiculous official English legislation.

For educated comments on this subject I direct you to these links.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/JWCRAWFORD/engonly.htm

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/JWCRAWFORD/question.htm

Also here is an essay I wrote years ago from a bilingual educator's point of view on the subject: My thoughts
See also these external links.

Southern Poverty Law Center

Article from 1994 by David Cole

Econonic Impact of Immigration (legal and illegal) Summary: Any negative benefits of driving down wages are only, at most, 4-5% and many times virtually disappear. More detailed explanations at link.

Statement by Rep. Luis V Gutierrez This is a great read!

Of course we could just throw away more money to build a fence. http://talkleft.com/new_archives/014871.html

It gets very frustrating.

Thank you for posting the facts. You are in a position to know so much more about this issue than the average DUer.

I have been disappointed in so many lately. Lou Dobbs is not helping. I just refuse to watch him anymore. I am watching a tape of The McLaughlin Group now and some of the things these guys are saying are horrid. Pat Buchanan says we are going to "lose our country"!!

It reminds me of the phony terror alerts. "Be afraid! Be very afraid - of Mexicans!" :scared:

Get real. 12 million illegals have devastated the pay for low & medium skill jobs.

I know. My ceramic tile contracting business cannot compete against illegal labor. There are many tasks I simply do not bid on any longer.

And there are hundreds of law abiding small & medium businesses in the same boat. Your lack of sympathy for working Americans is sad.

Wow. I am simply trying to make people realize that the immigrants that come here legal and illegal are not causing the problems for labor that many suggest. I showed you some documentation that supports my contention. Where is yours? I can sympathize with your problems. However, you should be more upset at your fellow contractors that choose to employ these people for dirt cheap wages instead of legally providing for Americans yet you decry me. There is something flawed in your logic. Did you read anything I posted?

But why actually study the facts?

The ignorance on this issue is just astounding here on DU.

ignore the sources cited by others.

Not long ago I responded to a reply that asked me to basically prove the impossible. I posted a very long list of non-biased cites that indicated the law in regards to Safe Haven Laws and also various cites that conformed not only my viewpoint, but the questions posed to me by the other poster. The response I got back: Oh, so I'm suppose to think it's fact because you believe it to be so. Had they read my entire post, they would have seen that I indeed backed up what I said in addition to validating their questions. It was clear they did not read.

People not reading and simply believing whatever they want to is how we end up with idiots like * in the White House.

I bet a whole sub-thread develops and an argument ensures... and nobody bothered to read the cited sources.

It's like what we deal with at school - with CHILDREN. But they are at least eager to learn.

Get real. Why not have the Mexican gov't provide the "facts"? They's be just as slanted.

Talk Left even links to their info. Do you get your info from thiswhack job reichwing backed immigration site?

should be the "official language," too.

"They's be" such persuasive spokespersons on this and so many other weighty topics.

:rofl:

instead of opinion pieces paraded as fact.

why do we have links, and you just have nada?

x

Since I can rarely even bring myself to refer to it as anything other than the Chimperor or, sometimes, Chimpy.

I was called a rethuglican down-thread but the post was deleted. I didn't even hit the alert button.

I think it's funny, really.

Thanks!

:-)

The studies are these: Card, 1990; Friedberg and Hunt, 1995; Card, 2001 and Borjas, 2003; Borjas and Katz, 2005 and still Holzer et al., 2005 plus Lewis 2005

after all, what's the difference between an "estimate" about the number of undocumented immigrants from a racist hate site and the Pew Hispanic Center's "estimate," really? Methodology, schmethodology.

:shrug: Do have anything to add to this thread other than a pic of some stoned dude and a reference to a vocabulary word?

Check again.

has presented a lot facts already on this in earlier threads. She is not being sanctimonious.

:shrug:

Or should we just give them a pass?

As was stated earlier, making wild (and false) claims and not backing them up with research or links seems to be a trend among the anti-immigration crowd here at DU. They seem to want to argue for arguments sake, just like school children. And if it walks like a duck, . . .

On the other hand, Maestro and I and several others who speak up on behalf of immigrants and undocumented workers have posted link after link after link. Look at the OP for this thread - that is a great example. Yet one of the first replies was one arguing with the OP with NO LINKS to support the argument.

And you think it is sanctimonious to criticize that. :eyes:

Sorry not in my world. This topic has been discussed to death. Yet, I can only think of ONE DUer who has moved from a racist misguided opinion to an understanding of the truth.

Maestro and I work with undocumented and documented immigrants. We spend 9 to 5 in their world. We understand this issue, we know their community and their culture well. Yet every time we post threads on it, we have a bunch of DUers who sound like RW republican racists waxing less than politically with comments that belong more on free republic than here.

The Democratic party I belong to cares about human beings and society. It does not have a selfish agenda. So when Duers post comments all about how they personally are suffering or how they believe the immigration problem is due to illegals stealing their jobs, well, they certainly don't sound like Democrats. That's the nicest comment I can make tonight.

from Free Republic and unworthy to be a Democrat.

That's precisely what I was talking about--thanks for providing such an excellent example.

That's why I saw through you long ago.

I think that people can have honorable disagreements on this issue. You think that there is only one correct position--yours--and anyone who does not share it is acting from base motives.

That attitude really does not leave room for discussion, only for preening and posing and boasting of one's wonderful moral superiority to the unwashed masses. You apparently enjoy that sort of thing, but I find it very tedious.

Well what a relief! Now I don't have to put on any more airs around you. LOL

:shrug:

My gig is up!

:hide:

... and that helps spread desperation. It's the "scab syndrome." When employers form trusts and alliances in restraint of wages and labor is impeded in organizing and cooperating ('illegals' avoid unions and can't vote), the result is inevitable - just like the days leading to the Great Depression.

What so many seem to completely miss is that the decline in real wages for the "bottom 90%" is, in large part, what threatens the long-term health of the Social Security system, which completely relies on the wage base of the "bottom 90%."

just to eat and these were Americans. So I think what is really driving down wages is lack of union power and lack of laws forcing employers to pay a fair wage.

... not the effect. Few remember that there was a rather serious depression in the early 20s. Few remember that the inequity in income distribution (particularly corporate/labor) had marginalized and impoverished a significant portion of the population - "rural Americans" - during the go-go days of the 20s. Profit (and the seduction of stock) became king and labor was marginalized. "Ownership" was regarded as a free lunch and many were gorging themselves. It's the same con-game we're seeing today.

I would argue that the CURE in the Great Depression was in establishing wages ABOVE what the desperate were willing to accept! It was called "The New Deal" - the idea that the systemic distribution ("deal") of wealth created by labor required greater fairness.


We've entered another era of "robber barons," as the following graph suggests.

business to change things. Imagine if the minimum wage got raised to $12 an hour, where it should be today with inflation.

Also, with poor wages many people legally working or not are working two to three jobs, which means that the job market shrinks. Now with this talk to raise the retirement age to 67 or even 70, those jobs that would go to younger people won't be available further shrinking the job market. This alone drives wages down in a job market ruled by laissez faire (sp?) economics.

The stagnation of the Federal Minimum Wage is a symptom, not a cause. At the same time, the chart I provided above doesn't portray the scope of the problem. Imagine, for example, if ALL labor were "honored" like the 'labor' of a CEO!

Figure 6: CEOs' pay as a multiple of the average worker's pay




Figure 7: CEOs' average pay, production workers' average pay, the S&P 500 Index, corporate profits, and the federal minimum wage, 1990-2004 (all figures adjusted for inflation)




At the same time, take a look-see at the manner in which our economic system is distributing the capital shares that're created by labor...


Figure 5: Share of capital income earned by top 1% and bottom 80%, 1979-2003 (From Shapiro & Friedman, 2006.)




When I take note that the current "Net Operating Income per Employee" in the S&P500 corporations is approximately $85,000 and that this is more than double the average employee compensation (including CEOs!!), the clear question becomes: "What is the actual apportionment of the wealth created by labor between the owners and the workers??" and "What is a just and fair share of that wealth that should accrue to workers? owners?"

The problems of opposing interests of owners (capital) and workers (labor) are very well-known. Marx was but one to have pointed to these problems.

Nonetheless, we still don't have either a reliable measure of that apportionment or a developing sense of what's FAIR! In a world awash in statistics and measures of the finance of wealth, we have HIDDEN the one key measure of equity. NOI/Emp suggests that ownership is now collecting 2/3rds of the wealth created by labor ... even before the burdens of taxation to pay for the governmental system that enforces entitlements of wealth!

Such deliberate ignorance serves only the powerful and privileged.

was going to college, I made minimum wage working at various cafeteria, retail and restaurant jobs. I could actually afford to support myself on it like rent a modest studio apartment, feed and clothe myself and buy my books and lab fees and buy insurance and gas for my jalopy to get around in. (Back then tuition was free in all state colleges and universities and that helped a lot.) Even so it was tough working full time and going to college full time. There was no time for a social life.

Also, unions were stronger then so when unions brought wages up in the blue collar sector, the non-union job wages also went up. We need to go back to those days in respect to labor anyway so we can move forward. Of course these were the last days of the Eisenhower administration, and the days of Camelot and later Lyndon Johnson's "war on poverty". It's too bad Johnson took a big misstep with the Vietnam war because domestically he shined. Also, I don't ever remember in those days not working side by side with a Mexican immigrant, who earned what I did and payed taxes on it.

So, I think this race baiting with the immigration issue is another distraction like Terri Schiavo while BushCo gets Karl Rove out of trouble and by default himself while no one is looking.

My first jobs in the early 80s paid minimum wage, and I could never afford my own place and ended up in some unpleasant roommate situations. I certainly could not afford to go to school -- all I could afford was rent, food, and gas (fortunately my car was paid for). I remember what a genuine financial hit it was for me, when the Reagan admin. increased the SS deductions.

I think you're right about Johnson, and what most people forget is that when corporate tax rates were at their highest, under Eisenhower, the middle class was at its peak.

anymore. My husband and I were barely making ends meet with our professional salaries, although part of our problem was supporting his first family. This is what Reagan/Bush did for us.

It was NOT enough to support a spouse or a child. Slaves don't "support" spouses or children ... they "support " the indolent owners. The owners are JEALOUS of their entitlements to the proceeds of the labors of others. It has been that way for three millennia - from the pyramids to the cathedrals and palaces to the temples to Mammon of today.

Now I want to share an epiphany ...

In a "war" one must kill people with whom one has the most common interests. (Many combat veterans understand this ... and that comprehension comes at a very great emotional cost.)

Wars are not declared between ordinary people. That's never been the case. It's ordinary people who do the fighting and dying.

We're in a war. It's a global "class war" - a war to increase the global entitlements of the very wealthy. The economically oppressed and educationally disadvantaged have been 'conscripted' into an invading army in this "war."

We make the mistake of missing this fundamental fact at our peril.

I've been a qualified Life Saver most of my life - Red Cross trained and (for a long time) certified. If you think the people whose welfare you're working to preserve won't kill you, you're a fool.

This is quite possibly the most crazy-making aspect of any "war" - the combatants have more in common with each other than they do with their respective 'leaders.' At the same time, each must try to kill the other. As a Viet Nam veteran, I can tell you this isn't an easy realization.

For this reason both spouses worked and they lived in slummy housing, but at least they weren't homeless like today.

Depression.

And your graph really puts it in such stark perspective.

Your business is competing against immoral greedy contractors who are paying (in my city) as little as $1.00 an hour to day laborers. Those businesses are where your anger should be directed - and at our govt that allows this abuse to continue.

Maestro has demonstrated time and time again that he understands this issue. His views reflect compassion for ALL involved.

How sad that you fail to see the whole picture here.

statistical documentation with facts and statistics to back these claims.
All I am reading on these threads is ancedotal.

:evilgrin:

How sad. Damn ignorant attitudes.

I want to know if they are from RW think tanks.

I'm positive the poster in question is out gathering facts. :evilgrin:

no one on my ignore list has shown up yet. Usually, they flock to these threads.

:evilgrin:

Come out, come out wherever you are!! LOL

type of thread all the time.

My particular friend has a post count that you could count on one hand AND this particular thread is the only one they have posted on. Hostility from the very beginning. Quite suspicious. Whenever I see a flamefest going, I quick search on who is involved. My little search never fails to disappoint me.

I have noticed that those who start things with me have a history of fighting. Some are newbies and some have been here, arguing with everyone, for a few years.

If it wasn't so distracting from the original post, it would be funny. Maybe we need to see if Skinner can set up a subgroup where people can go to argue! :evilgrin:

"troll pit". They send disruptors there for a little while so you can play with their heads before they ban them. I don't think DU administrators think this is very high minded and I tend to agree.

I've never heard of that!


P.S. I wasn't serious about an arguing thread. Who the hell would want to go there? :shrug:

The mods move the last offending post to the troll pit and it's the only place they are allowed to post until they are banned permanently. In the meantime everyone who desires to can go in and argue with them. I personally don't like the concept. It seems uncivil, however, there have been some trolls in the past I wouldn't have minded going there.

I think he is a friend of mine too. :rofl:

and called me sanctimonious. Well when one can't back up what one says with facts, one resorts to ad hominem attacks. :eyes:

I thought he was calling ME sanctimonious! That's my insult and I ain't sharing it with you. LOL

:rofl:

I thought it was directed to me. These debates get hard to follow at times. But please take it. :rofl: :hi:

Sadly, you will probably find those sources here - IF they exist.

There are a lot of ancedotal "I used to make $20 an hour and now my job is $9 an hour because of the immigrants."

Maybe it's true but is that a whole trend for the industry? Or a city? Or are these isolated incidents? I want to see a factual study from a reputable organization or university backing these figures.

In the past I have asked for studies regarding Social Security and health care and as it turns out, the studies could be traced to right wing think tanks who essentially pulled the figures out of their collective asses.

:evilgrin:

Some of the sources in the original post were hardly from disinterested 3rd parties. Why no provide Pres. Fox's talking points. After all the Mexican gov't has hired a Dallas PR firm to assist with their lobbying.

I guess my first hand experience as an American employer that won't hire illegals and competes against those that do mean nothing to you.

I guess you were for opinions and facts before you were against them.

Let me guess.

with companies that hire illegals.

and a large fund of convenient personal anecdotes, too, I wager.

Unfortunately, they are of little to no evidentiary value.

Yes, I can tell you plenty. Years ago I worked for company that brought illegals over by the truck load from Mexico. They put them up by the dozens (no exaggeration) in a little (again, no exaggeration) house. The conditions were rotten. If one of the workers got hurt, they were shipped back.

This was in east Texas. At the time unemployment was pretty high, but my employer could not have cared less about hiring locals when cheap and controllable labor was so easy to get.

And today this exploitation still goes on every day. Only now it is in many loactions throughout the country.

Keep in mind the lousy wages the illegal earns goes far in Mexico. You might say not so lousy. And keep in mind 1 in 10 Mexicans is here illegally. What happens when it is 2 in 10?

Now maybe you are not in an industry that's being squeezed. But just imagine there were plentiful laborers ready and willing to take YOUR job - right now, today- and every other job in your industry at one quarter, maybe one half your wage. I can assure you Clio, you'd have a different opinion, even if it did not have "evidentially value".

Somehow I just don't see the same outrage about that.

framers, sheetrockers, restaurant workers, etc.

I feel for those Americans hurt by H-1B workers coming in and taking their jobs and suppressing their wages. The fact is working people are being shafted by illegals oversupplying the labor force.

It has been notorious for hiring and exploiting these workers. Anyhow, in this case, I think we all agree that this was illegal and should not be condoned. However, it brings me back to the point that I continue to hammer home. The immigrant (documented or undocumented) is not to blame here. This person went out of his/her way to bring in illegal workers. These workers knew that they could earn a better wage in the US. By your own admission their lousy income would go far in Mexico. As a result these people come or are willing to be loaded onto a truck to work in slave conditions simply to better themselves. They didn't wake up and decide to "steal" jobs from Americans or drive down wages for the American worker. The person at fault is the business, period.

They elect to come here. In fact, according to Pew Research (a REAL source for info), half of Mexicans that illegal come to the US leave jobs in Mexico.

Are employers to be blamed? Yes.

But illegals have a willing role in this.

Tone down the attitude. I never insinuated any of that. Take a calmative, please. It is impossible to debate or discuss with some here.

Yes, mu attitude gets pretty stident when my job is at stake.

The Corn piece does not. I wish it did have a bibliography but it backs up what I say at least anecdotally. I will post this data that backs up what Cole says about assimiliation (I hate that word). Immigrants are learning the language much faster than before.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/JWCRAWFORD/can-pop.htm

My economic impact link refers to the following studies: Card, 1990; Friedberg and Hunt, 1995; Card, 2001 and Borjas, 2003; Borjas and Katz, 2005 and still Holzer et al., 2005 plus Lewis 2005

But it's apparent that most aren't reading 'em.

http://www.sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/business/14261623.htm

http://unlawflcombatnt.blogspot.com/2006/05/illegal-immigration-suppresses.html

http://www.econlib.org/LIBRARY/Enc/Immigration.html

"Between 1980 and 2000, legal and illegal immigration reduced the average annual earnings of U.S.-born men by an estimated $1,700 or roughly 4 percent, according to research done in 2004 by George Borjas, economics professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

The situation was worse if one considers only the 10 million U.S.-born men who lack a high school degree. For them, the increased supply of workers depressed wages by 7.4 percent, he found."

Borjas study. Thanks.

The linked congressional testimony singles out construction related trades as taking a bigger hit.

It's also important to note that the 4-5% effect is based on all immigrants, not just illegal immigrants. Since those here with documentation presumably have more ability to demand minimum wage or prevailing wages, their aggregate wage level is likely to be closer to that of native-born workers.


From the link:
Two additional points are important here. First, the potential competition to less-educated American workers from immigrants depends in part on the overall health of the economy. Immigration rates have been fairly constant to the U.S. over the past few decades. In the very strong labor markets of the late 1990's, these rates of immigration did not prevent us from achieving extremely low unemployment rates and real earnings growth, even among the least-educated Americans. In the more sluggish labor markets since 2001, the same rate of immigration generates more concern about job competition (Sum, 2004; Camarota, 2004). ...

Second, the illegal status of perhaps one-third of immigrants might well magnify any competitive pressures they generate for less-educated native-born workers. The reduced wages and benefits associated with their illegal status offer employers one more incentive for hiring them instead of native-born workers, who might be interested in some of these jobs and might be more appealing to employers at equal wages.

undocumented or not. The reason labor is taking a hit now is because the repukes have ruined yet another economy since 2001. The second part I do agree with however real reform here is going to take place when we stop scapegoating the undocumented worker and try to 1) better train and 2) educate the workforce. As an educator I hate the way our system expects all to go to college. All children are capable of learning but some need a more vocational route while others a more academic route.

Secondly, we need to ban together and lobby for comprehensive health care plans for workers. The article even mentions child care for workers and supporting unions. I am all for that.

Kicking out undocumented workers and creating havoc in families are not going to make life better for the American worker I'm sorry to say. The whole point of this thread was simply to show that this fixation on the undocumented worker will do litte to solve any real problems.

of employment or the lack of wage increases to immigrants because everyone is optimistic about employment. That's why the first point is of concern to immigrants, especially those here without legal standing. It's the equivalent to venting frustration at scabs during a strike. The scab workers are just trying to make a day's wages, but because they allow the company to function in spite of the worker walkout union members focus a considerable amount of resentment on the replacement workers when the anger should be focused on the union-busting management and labor laws.

Your other points (return to voc ed focus, health and child care, and unions) are items where we are in agreement, but the point of my post was to assure the earlier poster that his anecdotal experience of a more significant wage impact was not contrary to the overall average of a 4-5% reduction in wages because some professions may see no wage impact at all and others, particularly higher wage ones, may see more significant wage suppression.

I didn't say that I was in favor of wholesale kicking out undocumented workers, but you may have been responding to more than one post. My view on the long term illegal immigrants is that we can't expect that most even have a 'home' in their old country anymore. Our failure to enforce existing law is how we ended up where we are today. I'm in favor of penalizing employers large and small for hiring illegal aliens -- in fact I believe that those who have underpaid people through less than minimum wage or failure to pay SS employer contributions need to pony up for those costs AND pay fines that are scaled to the egregiousness of their labor offenses. An employer who was fooled by fake ID for a small number of employees doesn't deserve stiff punitive fines. The ones who actively recruited from coyotes and violated wage laws willfully, like the pallet maker recently in the news, deserve to pay hefty fines and the management should be facing felony convictions.

At the same time, once the Congress hashes out a reasonable compromise on how to handle the current illegal immigrants AND how to regularize future immigrations, then we address whether routine deportation for future illegal immigrants is the right solution.

on this issue. Thanks for keeping it civil.

And yet the wages for sheetrocking, roofing, tile setting and framing have moved little in 10 years. What that tells me is excess labor- cheap excess labor- is killing wages.

And this is no secret. I have had many customers and prospective customers tell me they are getting the work done cheaper becuase they are hiring illegal labor. They have no reason to hide it. It is not as if they will be punished or prosecuted for using illegal labor or contractors that hire illegal labor.

...what their gut instincts tell them, they generally find that it's not true, and that on balance illegal immigrants make a net positive contribution to many aspects of the U.S. economy. Here's a recently published example: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/16/business/yourmoney/16view.html?ex=1302840000&en=2314f86f5f3affb4&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

The question of whether the illegal immigration labor pool is harming the overall economy is different from their effect on particular occupations or particular skill levels. In fact in your link Borjas says as much.

From a policy making point of view, the effect on the larger economy is relevant. From a worker point of view, the effect of a greatly increased labor pool and increased competition for available work is likely to exert a downward pressure on wages. Most people accept that fair is fair if people choose to move into your area and increase the competition on a level playing field in terms of labor practices. It is no longer fair when the competition are people who are willing to under conditions that may violate labor or OSHA standards because of their illegal worker status, or when employers are openly choosing to go this route. It's hard for affected workers to swallow the findings that on average illegal immigrant participation in the workforces has a neglible effect on wages. For affected workers, it's personal. Too often the discussion on this topic here forgets that aspect.

that are taking a hit.

And I might make 2 more points: A 4-5 % drop in wages is, in fact, pretty huge for working people.

And the 2nd point: If the 4-5% is an average of the drop of all wages on a national basis, then the drop in wages in specific trades (like sheetrocking and tile setting) exceed that average. And if you factor it by region, the Southwest would have an even greater drop.

Thanks Mike_c.

Look nobody here that supports what I have to say is all for giving undocumented workers a free ride, but our point has been that the ones to blames are the ones that continue to hire undocumented workers. Blame them for providing the jobs. If there were no jobs for them, they would not come. All of the emphasis on the immigrant is creating a plethora of unwanted side-effects such as the ludicrous English as a unifying language crap, the racist Minute Men, etc... Blame those who are truly to blame and that will go a lot farther in protecting the American worker.

Because those hard working people are only trying to support their families by picking fruit and vegetables on all those construction sites. That lazy ass American construction worker does not deserve a job or representation, because the illegal worker is only trying to support his family back home.

Yet, these same people still cannot figure out why the Democratic Party has lost so many working class voters, and why working people vote against their best interests. Nope, granting amnesty to illegal 'farm workers,' who are picking lettuce and oranges growing on construction sites, is more important than demanding the current law be enforced against employers. By loudly demanding a crack down with the current law, with massive fines against employers of illegals, the Democratic Party could have reclaimed a lot of lost working class voters. But no, they must advocate for the illegal workers picking fruit and vegetables at the construction job sites, instead of that lazy ass American construction worker, who thought he could support his family like his father and grandfather did.

And, they will keep wondering why working people vote against their best interests, while claiming to have a superior intellectual insight of the problem, over those who see firsthand what exactly is happening and how it affects them. But that doesn't matter, because those illegal workers don't threaten THEIR economic security and livelihood. Some even indirectly benefit from such an increase in illegals in the country, which adds economic security to their employment position, but bringing that up is being ridiculous.

I didn't know that produce was grown on construction sites. Or picked by construction workers.

:crazy:

Would all those illegal farm workers be at construction sites?

After all, they are only doing all the low pay dirty jobs that Americans won't do.:sarcasm:

American construction workers will do hard dirty construction jobs, so there must be a bumper crop of lettuce and oranges growing on all those construction sites. Why else would all the illegal farm workers be there?

Do you think every illegal is a "farm worker"? Just doesn't make sense, seems like you're trying to be clever and just coming off as nuts.

My point it, you fail to achieve anything but incoherence,

Even so, I understood his point just fine.

What is ironic about the concept of picking produce at construction sites? Have I missed some part of the anti-anti-immigrant argument that he/she/it was attempting to lampoon?

The illegals are only do cheap farm work that Americans just won't do. These advocates claim that the illegal workers are not taking anyone's job, because they are providing cheap labor for vegetables and fruit to be picked, so all these illegal farm workers are needed to supply America with cheap produce at the grocery store.

So, to accept the illegal worker advocates explanation, there must be a bumper crop of produce growing all over construction sites across America. After all, the illegal workers are only suppose to be doing cheap farm work, that no American wants to do. Since illegal worker advocates want their position to be a fact, then America has a bumper crop of produce growing all over construction sites and these illegal farm workers are picking produce off of the site, so the American construction worker can have a clean safe job site.

The only other explanation would be that illegal workers are driving down wages and taking jobs from American construction workers. Advocates for illegal workers say that is just not happening, so it must be a bumper crop at construction sites all over America. Understand now?

I haven't seen this claim made, hence my confusion

and clever.

My only quibble would be with your point that the dem pols will somehow be surprised by their failure to connect with the working class voter on immigration. As far as I can tell, they LIKE a country divided 50-50 and are perfectly content to give the repugs an opportunity to "catch up" on this issue.

Everything else aside, there was ABSOLUTELY no excuse for a bi-partisan senate vote to leave the guest worker provision in the immigration bill. Talk about a knife to the jugular of organized labor.

The poster apparently doesn't want to.

Stop blaming the poor even if they are illegals. You want this to stop, stop the millionaires and billionaires who throw out the bait to lure them into our country, illegally. Jesus, is this too hard for people to grasp?

except for whom they are.

I was actually laughing so hard, I almost peed myself. The guy was Demonizing.... ready for this..... "MUSLEMS". That's right... he hates "MUSLEMS" and believes they are going to kill us all. He repeated his mispelling throughout the whole post of his, so I cordially made him aware that he hated an entity that did not exist, and that if he meant to say "MUSLIMS", he may want to know more about them before he builds his bunker in his backyard.

The guy wasn't amused, but everybody else seemed to love how this guy could hate a group of people he couldn't even address properly.

I also advised him to learn the English language a little better, that it was the "American" thing to do..

You just can't give away our jobs fast enough, huh? Pres. Bush appreciates your support for open borders.

Because it benefits their line of work, and it gives them job security. No illegal is going to take a job from a teacher, that teach children of illegals, so they have an interest in keeping their workload. The funny thing is, that they claim to support existing laws being enforced and a crack down on employers, yet demand amnesty and citizenship for the illegal workers already here. Links are posted to sign petitions to legalize farm workers doing all the dirty low paying jobs Americans won't do, and refuse to look at all these 'farm workers' on construction sites. But don't you dare bring that up, because you cannot back that up with a study from immigration lawyers or the Mexican government. Besides, who you going to believe, immigration advocates or your lying eyes at the job site? Never mind those farm workers picking produce off of that half completed building.

Then these same people, who put illegal workers ahead of American workers, just cannot figure out why so many working people vote against their own economic best interest when elections roll around. They would rather sit back, mock and ridicule those who see and feel the effect first hand, and refuse to accept what working people see and feel everyday.

x

I especially like your journal entries -- they really trace how this issue has developed over the past few months, as well.

I'm also glad to see a professional in bilingual education speak up, since I have seen some bizarre attacks on it here lately.

you can check out this link.

I hope all the links are good. I haven't updated the site in quite some time since I am no longer a bilingual teacher but now an administrator of one of the biggest bilingual schools in the surrounding Dallas area.

Bilingual debate and hope for educating immigrants

And waves to another dweller in the Metroplex!

That people support a big police action because they think they will end up with better wages and health care. It's the cops, not the immigrants, who are sucking up all the public resources. Wake up, America!

The police are understaffed and underpaid as well.

It's the agri-businesses and other corporate entities that are feeding this.

Most of what they do is enforce useless drug laws against poor people. The whole law enforcement enterprise including border patrol must be scaled back and replaced with education and infrastructure if this country is going to survive.

out at night unless we hired private body guards and without the courts there would be no justice at all. We need to revamp our laws so that cops don't get sent out on meritless investigations and arrests.

Changing the laws means firing the cops or else finding something else for them to do as cops. The second part kinda scares me...

For one thing cops no matter how much you hate them go to work everyday with the knowledge that they may get injured or killed. When I was a bartender I had off-duty cops as customers and actually they hated enforcing the crappy laws and often didn't unless there was no way out of it because they said they would rather be going after real criminals.

At times other customers would be smoking you know what in the parking lot (against the law) they didn't do anything but let me know it was going on so I could tell them not too. (This could have lost the bar it's license if an ABC inspector happened to come around.) You see I had to enforce laws too. I had to make sure I didn't serve minors, people who were drunk or allow dope to be used in there.

Legalized drugs (marijuana taxed/sold like alcohol, hard drugs distributed at govt. clinics) would leave a lot of people, especially in the ever-growing prison industry, under-employed. But I doubt they would then want to give up their incomes, benefits, authority, and political influence. Prison guards are, for instance, the most influential lobby in California. People given the kind of dictatorial position that War-on-Drugs era police personnel hold have never given it up without a fight. They'll need some new "War" to justify continuation of business.

Police are paid out of the same property taxes that fund schools. If we had the guts to take a little risk, shift some money from one to the other, we would see an across-the-board benefit (including crime reduction) in just a few years. Not educating people and then paying armed men to protect us from them is stupid.

That must be a state thing, because it is certainly not the case in my state. Wow. That is just strange.

Local police are paid out of property taxes, which makes rich areas rich in cops and shorts poor areas. Another thought I've had, beyond the immediate need to end the drug-war holocaust, is that states should take over all local dept.'s and assign them according to crime rates rather than how rich the jurisdiction is.

just as funding education based on property taxes because you know where the nicest schools and best paid teachers are without a seriously complicated revenue sharing program to redistribute wealth.

http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/news/politics/14530333.htm

snip:

Property taxes are the main revenue source -- 61 percent -- for the $396 million general fund, most of which pays for police and fire.

during prohibition. I'm all for legalizing drugs and cutting out the illegal profit. But to suggest cutting down police protection is insane. If we repealed proposition 13 we could get back the money we need for schools, mental facilities and everything else that was cut off because of it. I consider Prop 13 the biggest reason for homelessness and drug crimes that we have. Before then there were very few homeless because marginal people were cared for in facilities that met their special needs.

I don't think we even need to rescind the taxes on primary residence, but we should be taxing all those extra homes, vacation homes, condos in the city, out of state homeowners like Warren Buffett, Dave Letterman and others as well as all those rich Arab sheiks who own mansions in Beverly Hills. Tax them all at before proposition 13 rates.

bullshitting and laughing after a DWB stop, and my college freshman students can't read or write a sentence, I'm willing to risk a little less police protection.

The cops where there are the greatest number of cops--rich areas--have very little to do already other than weed out "undesirables" based on racial and property profiling. The inner cities do need more cops now, but without drug crime (including theft and robbery and gang violence) the need would diminish greatly. If the excess cops from rich areas were deployed to the meanest streets, there could be a net reduction in cops with no reduction in public safety. It would just be easier to get through a rich neighborhood if you were brown or driving a crappy car.

The inner cities do need more cops, which is exactly my point. I know that the way things are today that they are pretty corrupt. However, what goes on in inner city neighborhoods is what would happen all over without cops and the inner city neighborhoods would be even more vulnerable because they wouldn't be able to afford the rent-a-cops that the rich can afford. We need them.

We have always needed warriors so the tribe can go about it's business, farming, tending the livestock and raising families. Without warriors to keep the bullies out, we have rape and pillage. Is that what you want?

People are mostly okay, even mentally ill drug addicted homeless ex-cons--I know this because I spent the day among exactly such a population yesterday, talked to about 25 one on one and the only thing I got was a bad sunburn. I saw one fight break out and about six people stepped in to stop it. (Ironically, behind walls it would have escalated to a "dv" case!) As far as I'm concerned the cops cause crime by driving everyone indoors after a certain hour. Where lots of people mingle there is a natural effect of peacekeeping.

I like the British style of policing (well, that of former years at least before they made one of many stunning mistakes in the form of copying us). Conflict resolution in public places and relentless pursuit of those who commit crimes. Being caught on the spot and being caught eventually are equal deterrents. I would like to see more detectives pursuing those who commit and especially those who profit from crime. And less gas burned patrolling the places with high property values.

Rich neighborhoods are protected from crime because a. the people have more lucrative ways of making a living and b. have aspirations in life and strong social groups that help restrain them from acting on wild impulses. If the poor were given both--policies that build education, strong families, and above all job and business opportunities--crime would diminish without any further policing.

I completely disagree with your analogy between policing within a society and defense against foreign invaders. In general your idea smacks of individual rather than social evil, which to me is the major dividing line between beliefs left and right. We didn't always have a militarized police force in this country, so what changed to make this necessary?

I still think it's very wrong to dump on the blue collar people who put their lives on the line to protect us. They aren't perfect and the institution isn't perfect. But they are doing a rather difficult job and their leadership isn't the best, like mayors of cities, county boards of supervisors, governors of states...

All I can say is I met a very nice deputy sheriff in Texas, a woman who lived in a trailer with her young son, and who was a rather nice Amazonian type woman who taught me how to shoot firearms. Yet, she was someone I knew would lay her life on the line for a victimsif needed.

She went to church yet defended a "lot lizard" (a hooker who hangs around truck stops) from some rather nasty fundies.

So I guess in your world people who punch a clock have no worth unless it's something you agree with.

I have nothing against truckers, loggers, or oil rig workers personally, but I want all their jobs to disappear and be replaced with different jobs (train men, hemp farmers, alternative energy workers). Some will adapt, others will need help. The world evolves and expects everyone to evolve with it.

Hanging sheetrock, laying tile, finishing concrete, etc. is not in a state of technological upheaval. The skills are about the same they were 50 years ago.

These jobs are not being lost to new and better machines or processes. They are being lost to cheap illegal labor.

How about staying on topic, eh?

I am not "for" illegal labor, I am "against" any further expansion of law enforcement such as would be needed to enact any removal of illegal aliens. So to me it is extremely germane. I am talking about the loss of police jobs when this country comes to its senses. You might read the subthread. I think it's up to the mods to decide what's "off-topic," and against the rules to make these kinds of statements as a non-moderator.

then yes, I wholeheartedly agree. If we could wave a magic wand and rid ourselves of every undocumented worker, I don't that big business would any time soon begin to care more for the worker and begin to provide comprehensive medical and retirement plans plus a decent wage that outpaces the cost of living.

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And who wanted to felonize illegal immigrants.

If you're going to talk in Double-Speak, you need to be a little less obvious.

it was the REPUKES! Also one of my links talks about how much it would cost to build the fence. Let's just burn money, shall we?

That is almost laughable if it weren't so sad. :rofl: I simply want to punish those who are responsible, the businesses that disregard American labor and continue to exploit these immigrants. My view is more humanistic if anything; not repuke really. Any more ad hominen attacks or do you have something further to add to the debate?

It's the American Way, after all, and standing in the way is futile.

Let's get on with it and devour our natural resources to make products that we don't even need but we desire on account of advertising and the deeply-developed national religion of materialism!

From your economic impact:


There is sarcasm in this post.

A state has a right to establish secure borders. How many countries would tolerate having hundreds of thousands or even a million people entering every year without even identifying themselves? Such an avenue enables criminals to flee America, then reenter to commit further scams. There is also an obvious national security problem enabling spies or operatives to enter.

I also find it unconscionable that America would adopt a policy that undocumented residents could be rounded up in sweeps or picked up on traffic violations then sent out of America. That is just cruel, because it would break up families. There needs to be legal residency and a path to citizenship for those who are in America.

Control at the border and establishing legal residence for all the workers/residents of America would drive up the wages and standard of living of all concerned: native born and immigrants. The supply of labor would not be "almost limitless", as was the problem in The Grapes of Wrath--wages would have to rise. Further, employers would not be able to coerce their employees with the threat of expulsion.

I just can't stand the immigrant bashing.

I also find it unconscionable that America would adopt a policy that undocumented residents could be rounded up in sweeps or picked up on traffic violations then sent out of America. That is just cruel, because it would break up families. There needs to be legal residency and a path to citizenship for those who are in America.



My group tries to make baby blankets for the new mothers who have no safety net. These are the poorest of the poor who have no idea how they will support this new life they have just delivered. They have no cribs or diapers or clothes for their new baby.

Some of the women are here legally and some are not.
We have been told that many of these new, unwed mothers were raped as they tried to get to our area to be with a relative or where there is a promise of a job. Some are just sweet talked into sex by men who have wives south of the border or by boyfriends who have no intention of marrying them -- boyfriends who run when they get the news of a pregnancy.

Some of these men are now claiming they can't be deported because they have a child here! These men will never see nor support that child. Do these men even have a right to say that they are part of a family if they aren't living as a family unit? Personally, I don't consider the rapists to be desirable members of society. I'm not too fond of the deadbeat dads either.

I believe the poster is referring to the fact that some undocumented workers entered here and started families. Their babies were born here and are citizens. They do not need to be deported but sending the father away would break up the family. Or an undocumented worker could have married someone with residence papers. That person can stay, the other can't. What you speak of does occur unfortunately. If some are claiming this, there needs to be some sort of proof that the person is supporting that child is some way.

Thank you. and good luck

..immigrants over 20 years. Yes, that is a fact-based, conservative estimate of how many new immigrants will come into the United States over the next 20 years as a consequence of this Bush proposed, Senate shaped immigration proposal.

Just let those numbers sink in; 100 million over 20 years. A 30% increase over the present population in the blink of 20 years. Has any society ever managed to maintain civility and coherency under such enormous population pressure? And 20 years from now, how will we be in a position to even slow-down or curtail further immigration. We are talking about having close to 1 billion people in this country within 60-80 years. Is this really necessary. Is this really desireable. How will we be able to preserve anything resembling a healthy environment with those numbers. And, sorry, national parks are not the solution. National parks should be just the icing on the cake of maintaining a healthy environment. We dont' need spawl, we don't need to sate the ever-greedy consumer.

Our immigration policy is abusurd. It is suicidal. And call me racist, nativist, all you want, but guilt and sentimentality do not make a good basis for sound policy.

It's not the immigrants but the small and large businesses that employ them and attract more.