Every week on Monday morning , the Council and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day. This week's question: How Would You Solve The Problem Of Illegal Immigration?
Simply Jews: Building a few pyramids in Texas and/or Arizona?
The Noisy Room: Priority one is closing the border - for real. Take a page from the Israelis on building a fence and just do it. Go for a layered approach using a fence, a concrete wall and vehicle-barrier trenches. And put either armed military or border patrol in sufficient numbers all along the wall who are willing to enforce the law and use force if necessary. The presence needs to be stepped up because we are factually being invaded from the south.
Remove ALL incentives and enticements that attract or encourage people to enter the country illegally. This includes benefits such as food stamps, housing, education, health care... in short, all the freebies being sprinkled in front of the target demographic. Illegal immigrants should not be eligible for any government paid services, accept in life-threatening instances. And after that passes, they should be deported. The 'Anchor Baby' provision also needs to go away.
As to illegal immigrants already here... Once you have the border actually secured, your next step is to deport those who are not 'legitimate immigrants,' when they are nabbed for crimes. You don't catch and release. You either prosecute and convict, then deport after any imprisonment or the offender goes straight to deportation depending on the crime. There should be standardized methodology for anyone wanting to become a citizen and the same rules should apply to all. Enforce our current immigration policies. If families and children are found that are illegal, as cold as it sounds, they should be deported. Immigrants should be forced to follow our laws and come in the front door legally, rather than sneaking in the back door to reside in 'the shadows.'
We need to eliminate the concept that if you get away with a crime long enough, it becomes legitimized and somehow okay. The de facto policy at the moment seems to be that if you break the law by sneaking into the country and manage to evade detection and capture for some arbitrary amount of time, you get declared 'all in free.'
What we don't need is mass 'Amnesty,' which makes 11 million criminals instant citizens who will comprise a Democratic voting block strong enough to keep Progressives in office and power indefinitely. It is a strategy that the Communists/Marxists are putting forth and using as an overthrow and infiltration from within tactic. See Italian Communist Party leader, Antonio Gramsci, who promoted exchanging the subtle long-term infiltration of institutions and Government for the outdated, confrontational street-marching tactics of Mao Tse Tung.
A physical barrier coupled with the removal of incentives would take care of the vast majority of illegal incursions. I think the current Immigration Bill put forth not only pushes mass 'Amnesty,' it doesn't solve the problem of illegal immigration. It literally overrides our current laws and policies concerning immigration, rather than enforcing them and opens the borders to all. It would make everyone part of a massive, privacy stealing database (which is an unfathomable violation of our Constitutional rights and a dictator's dream) and would finish off bankrupting our nation. You might as well finalize handing the U.S. over to the Mexican nationalists and Communists. Progressives on both sides of the political aisle benefit from this with a massive voting block that will entrench their Marxist ideals and create a slave base that not only brings down the standard of living, but pushes crony capitalism. The only ones who benefit in the end are the Marxists, the powerful and the wealthy elite. Sounds a lot like Cuba or any of a number of Communist regimes, doesn't it?
JoshuaPundit: To solve a problem, you first have to think of it as a problem,That's really the first step. It's important to realize that there's an important political constituency that doesn't consider this a problem at all, but a political tactic and a net political benefit to themselves. There's a reason the Democrats are so ignited about pushing through what amounts to another amnesty, if you actually look at the bill the so-called Gang of Eight came up with.
Because of that, there's never going to be real cooperation in a number of blue run states or municipalities when it comes to things like building an actual border fence, or cooperating with enforcing any laws that limit what the Left refers to as 'immigrant rights'. There have been bills that called for fences and border enforcement before, but you'll notice they never were implemented. That's why.
So I think the first step ( which of course isn't being done in Congress) is to redo the entire context inwhich we view immigration. Rather than a 'right', it is a privilege a sovereign nation grants to people it decides would be a benefit to the country. It's forgotten now,but that was exactly the context under which America's great waves of legal immigration occurred in the mid 1840's and in the period from 1880 through the 1920's.We needed population to farm, to labor and to build a relatively young country. As an added bonus, when you have that attitude, it tells potential immigrants that American citizenship is something of value, not something you can just glom on to by walking across the border.
If we manage to change that context, a solution obviously involves controlling our border first and withholding Federal funds from any state not cooperating.We have to make it that ironclad or it weon;t happen.
Then we need to fix what's really wrong with our immigration system, ending the 'diversity lotteries'and basing immigration on what America needs rather than what suits partisan politics. There are plenty of people in Europe and in Asia who would love to come here with their money and their skills whom can't because the sysytem is so weighted towards Third World immigrants, legal and otherwise.
At the same time, we need to know who's here, so I'd institute a 60 day period when illegal aliens must register to receive a temporary( and renewable) ID showing their status or lose all rights to stay, permanently. That will give us time to run the background and health checks needed.There are a number of ways we can control illegal immigration when it comes to employment and other factors to remove a lot of the incentives while we're securing our border.
Australia and Canada use a points system which varies according to their needs at any particular time. They're competing for highly skilled, high productivity immigrants while we mostly import low skilled, low productivity immigrants.
While it would be both heartless and counterproductive to import all 11 million or so illegal aliens, we could use a points system and the market to decide how many of them stay. A common slogan of amnesty supporters is 'don't deport my uncle', 'don't deport my cousin' . Provided these people otherwise qualify, I see no reason why family members couldn't buy a visa for several thousand dollars for their friends and relatives and act as guarantors that they will not become a public charge.That's makes a lot more sense than the ridiculous notion that people are going to 'pay fines' and declare money they earned under the table and pay taxes on it. Seriously, would you?
The only penalty involved ought to be a place at the end of the line behind legal applicants from their country of origin when it comes to the waiting period for citizenship.
The Independent Sentinel: would start by enforcing the immigration laws we have, something that
has not been done in the last 30 or more years. Hiring cheap labor is
not cheap after all.
What I wouldn't do is pass the new immigration bill produced by the
gang of eight.
The Senate bill produces a massive bureaucracy of regulations and
government agencies. It is 844 pages with the promise of more. Rules
still need to be written for almost every aspect of it.
It changes the definition of "illegal immigrant" by replacing it with
"registered new Americans." The US Citizenship and Immigration
Services" will be called the "Office of Citizenship and New Americans."
Almost no one is "illegal" any longer under this bill.
While many wait for entry into this country legally, the people who
came here illegally are given "legal status" before the border is
secured, which could take another 5-10 years. If the border is not
secured, there are triggers which will set off yet another government
bureaucracy to look at it. It should work as well as sequester.
Amnesty includes deported illegal immigrants deported after 12/31/11.
It includes relatives of all - children, spouses, stepchildren,
orphans, widows, widowers, and so on.
Some criminals are exempt from deportation and most illegal immigrants
will be exempt from deportation.
Citizenship takes about 13 years except for DREAMers who will achieve
citizenship in five years.
Employers are actually incentivized to hire illegal workers over
citizens and residents because they won't have to pay for their
healthcare and neither they nor their illegal immigrant employees will
be fined. They are a special, protected class.
It will cost taxpayers a lot of course with $100 million alone for the
purpose of helping illegal immigrants wade through the onerous
paperwork and regulations to gain citizenship and the vote.
What I would prefer is not giving them legal status until the border is
secured, not on the word of Janet Napolitano, but on the word of law
enforcement.
Employers need to be held accountable and be required to check
citizenship.
A certain number of migrant workers could be allowed. Allowing students
to remain makes sense.
I would pass immigration reform piece-by-piece to see if it is working.
This massive senate bill was written in secrecy and is being rushed
through with the final hearing tomorrow. Did you know there was one
Friday?
Our visa program is failing because no one checks on people who
overstay visas and no one is ever deported as one can see in the case
of Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Our porous borders are welcomed by drug dealers
and terrorists. It's not only potential hard-working Americans as some
would have us believe.
*Weekend Monkey: Hidey ho, Primates! Y'know,I actually addressed this during my 2008 presidential campaign and if you'd voted for me, there's a lotta problems you have now woulda been solved, and that's the real banana!
"No primate left behind" was my slogan", and I meant it - uh, at least at the time.
There's nothing loco about cheap labor..we all like having people to mow our lawns, clean our toilets and wash our cars at working primate prices, yeah? The problem is that we aren't allowing the free market to give us a solution because of a coupla stoo-pid prejudices.
My wisdom would handle that. After all, if we can create one set of special policies aimed at creating a low wage underclass and exploiting their labor, why not another, especially when it saves us billions of dollars and keeps the price of labor down..and saves us megabucks on them pesky social welfare costs. Talk about biting a chunk out of that deficit!
Bookworm Room: People are rational actors. Rather than sealing 2,000-mile-long borders or raiding homes, I would start by disallowing all social services: food stamps, welfare, education, healthcare, etc. Only then, once I'd removed incentives and let that reality sink in for a while, would I start police action, such as deportation.
Having made America an unwelcoming place for illegal immigrants, I would sit down and look at my country's needs. I don't just mean its business/economic needs, although that matters tremendously. I'm also talking about the vitality that comes from immigration. That's a conversation the nation needs, but we should do it on our own terms, and not let the illegals choose the terms.
As the child of two legal immigrants, I am very pro-immigration. It's illegal immigration to which I object. For better or worse, a nation should have the right to decide who it lets in. Nor does this one-way border sealing make us like North Korea or Cuba, both of which refuse to let their own citizens out.
The Razor:
The vast majority of people I work with on a day to day basis were not born here. All came here legally from circumstances that were humbling if not outright horrifying at times. I would guess that the vast majority of them tend toward the Right, and I’ve even met a Ron Paul supporting libertarian.
I also live in one of the poorest counties in North Carolina. Some of the men I’ve hired as skilled contractors have complained to me about being underbid on jobs by companies employing illegal immigrants from Mexico. The influx of illegals has pushed down their wages as they’ve been forced to lower their bids to compete. They are good, hardworking and decent people who want to work, but jobs are scarce around here and the temptation to live on disability or some other form of welfare is always there. The oldest guys resist that temptation, but it’s tougher for the younger guys to. I have yet to see either side discuss the damage to middle class wages caused by illegal immigrants, probably because those it hurts tend to be religious and vote Republican.
The only solution I see would be to make illegal immigration truly illegal and treat it as such. Jail and deport illegals and their families, and severely punish the businesses that employ them. At the same time make it easier to legally immigrate here. Increase the quotas of all categories but especially skilled immigrants such as those I work with. The problem is that leftist ideology views capitalism as a polarizing system, and that leftists create such a system by throwing open the borders to unskilled immigrants who drive down wages for the middle class. It then becomes the government’s role to redistribute the wealth to create a fairer system.
The problem is that a fairer system would exist on its own if we had higher immigration quotas along with a bulletproof border.
(* Weekend Monkey was a Democratic presidential candidate in 2008. He now works in Washington as a special aide to Senator Elizabeth Warren)
Well, there you have it.
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