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Originally Posted by Dark_crow

There is an assumption being made with that line of thinking that is made about money. And that is that there is only so much money to divide. As I mentioned earlier, “The illegal immigrant does not effect regular immigration, and regular immigration is selective enough that it does not effect the poverty stricken illegal. So it works just fine to fill two separate needs.”

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On what basis do you make this statement? As I understand it, quite a few legal immigrants coming here are poverty stricken/lower class immigrants, who's livlihoods in this country are DIRECTLY EFFECTED by the influx of illegals.

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First, they are not being rewarded because when they are caught they are deported.

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No they aren't. THat's the point. The laws aren't being enforced. And in the few cases where they are deported, they just climb right back over the fence again the next day? The deportation isn't being enforced.

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Legal immigration is expensive, too expensive for the laborers who make-up the great majority of illegals.

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Again, what is the basis for this statement? What is the cost of legal immigration? I don't know the answer, and I suspect that you don't either. How do you know that it is too expensive for a laborer to come here legally? You have been TOLD that, but what is the economic/financial basis for that statement?

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There are certainly some racist, but I think they are very relatively few.

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I tend to agree. This isn't a racial issue. It's an issue of following the law. I have no problem with any legal immigrant to this country, regardless of race, religion, sex, age, income level, etc. And I don't think that most border-enforcement advocates have a problem with legal immigration either.

BTW, DC, what is your position with regard to illegals who travel back and forth across the border at will carrying infectious diseases such as Tuberculosis? There is a recent story of an illegal who came across the border on more than 20 sepparate occasions while infected with TB. Without border/immigration enforcement, how are we to protect ourselves from imported diseases brought in by illegal immigants? Do you feel that it isn't a major problem? That the economic benefits of having cheap labor outweigh the risks of a TB epidemic?

Elliot

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

On what basis do you make this statement? As I understand it, quite a few legal immigrants coming here are poverty stricken/lower class immigrants, who's livlihoods in this country are DIRECTLY EFFECTED by the influx of illegals.



No they aren't. THat's the point. The laws aren't being enforced. And in the few cases where they are deported, they just climb right back over the fence again the next day? The deportation isn't being enforced.



Again, what is the basis for this statement? What is the cost of legal immigration? I don't know the answer, and I suspect that you don't either. How do you know that it is too expensive for a laborer to come here legally? You have been TOLD that, but what is the economic/financial basis for that statement?



I tend to agree. This isn't a racial issue. It's an issue of following the law. I have no problem with any legal immigrant to this country, regardless of race, religion, sex, age, income level, etc. And I don't think that most border-enforcement advocates have a problem with legal immigration either.

BTW, DC, what is your position with regard to illegals who travel back and forth across the border at will carrying infectious diseases such as Tuberculosis? There is a recent story of an illegal who came across the border on more than 20 sepparate occasions while infected with TB. Without border/immigration enforcement, how are we to protect ourselves from imported diseases brought in by illegal immigants? Do you feel that it isn't a major problem? That the economic benefits of having cheap labor outweigh the risks of a TB epidemic?

Elliot

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Elliot

I keep hearing this ridicules claim from you that that the Border Patrol is not doing their job, what impertinence to suggest they are not. No, I'm not repeating something I have read. I have sat and watched many times while they made raids, they do it everyday. This business about “climbing right back over the fence” is far too simple minded too even consider. Are you a Racist, because your arguments sure should as irrational as does racist?

Here is an interesting read on the activities of anti-immigrant rights groups in the United States and their war on day laborers. Politicians like Tom Tancredo, Dana Rohrabacher, Joe Biden, and people like John Tanton. “John Tanton took $1.3 million -- the Federation for American Immigration Reform, FAIR, took $1.3 million from the Pioneer Fund, a group that advanced Nazi propaganda in the 1930s and which exists to fund the science of Hitlerian eugenics. This was a huge scandal, and John Tanton was sort of forced to retreat into the dark.”

Lou Dobbs is up to his neck in the movement and groups like the John Birch Society. The movement is rooted in the beliefs of David Duke.

“David Duke drove around in a car marked “Klan Border Watch” looking for undocumented immigrants on the border, and he was pursued by about forty reporters.
This was an enormous PR coup for the Ku Klux Klan, and it's been copied by grassroots pressure groups like the Minutemen, who -- they're adopting specifically a white nationalist strategy from the Ku Klux Klan, and they're working closely with.”

Democracy Now! | A Look at the Forces Behind the Anti-Immigrant Movement

DC

How do these posts answer any of my questions or counter any of my points?

Calling me racist for wanting to enforce the laws is childish and beneath what I have come to expect from you. So the KKK used to patrol the borders too. So what? Does that make it wrong to patrol the borders? The KKK marched in protests. Doe that mean that anyone else who maches in protests are like the KKK? Are the civil rights groups that marched in protests in the 60s racists because they are using the "methods" the KKK did?

C'mon, DC, you're better than that.

We have 11 - 12 million illegal immigrants in this country. That number alone tells me that the border patrol isn't doing their job. I'm not saying that it is their fault. They are under-funded and under-staffed. They are doing the best that they can with what they have. But that clearly isn't getting the job done. I am proposing better funding, cooperation with the resources of the military to solve staffing issues, and stronger support for their job by the government. Which part of that do you disagree with?

And you still haven't answered my question with regard to illegals coming across the borders with diseases like TB.

You can do better than this, DC.

Elliot

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

DC

How do these posts answer any of my questions or counter any of my points?

Calling me racist for wanting to enforce the laws is childish and beneath what I have come to expect from you. So the KKK used to patrol the borders too. So what? Does that make it wrong to patrol the borders? The KKK marched in protests. Doe that mean that anyone else who maches in protests are like the KKK? Are the civil rights groups that marched in protests in the 60s racists because they are using the "methods" the KKK did?

C'mon, DC, you're better than that.

We have 11 - 12 million illegal immigrants in this country. That number alone tells me that the border patrol isn't doing their job. I'm not saying that it is their fault. They are under-funded and under-staffed. They are doing the best that they can with what they have. But that clearly isn't getting the job done. I am proposing better funding, cooperation with the resources of the military to solve staffing issues, and stronger support for their job by the government. Which part of that do you disagree with?

And you still haven't answered my question with regard to illegals coming across the borders with diseases like TB.

You can do better than this, DC.

Elliot

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First, let me clear the air…I did not call you a racist, surly with your education your reading and comprehension should tell you that. I clearly referred to the language you used. Not only that, I do not for a moment believe you are racist. I do however believe the anti-immigration crowd are white nationalist; and therefore racist.

Secondly, I am not an advocate of illegal immigration I do not recommend anyone break the law; I just don’t believe it is nearly as big a problem as it has been made to out to be. It is congress who causes the problem and pressure groups of nationalist that hang-up such things as H2B visas.

Please read the link, it's very short:

“For years the three men have traveled to and from their homes in Mexico to Aurora, Colo., to work as seasonal employees for JBK Landscaping. The trio would seem to be the kind of foreign workers this country needs.
They are legally employed in jobs Americans won't do.

So it comes as a surprise that America's immigration system keeps throwing roadblocks in their way and the way of others who want to be like them.

By law, all three men must return to Mexico at the end of this month. All three leave with the very real fear that they may not be able to return to their jobs in the spring because the visa program that keeps them employed is bogged down in the immigration debate.”


Colorado Confidential:: With Visa Impass, Uncertainty Grows for Legal Workers, Employers

And the problem is not something new:

“April 10, 2004
A Shortage of Seasonal Workers Is Feared
By EDUARDO PORTER

Even as economists worry about the lackluster growth in employment, and politicians rail against the loss of jobs to overseas outsourcing, many employers across the country are sounding alarms about an impending shortage of foreign temporary workers this summer.
From roe processors in Alaska to innkeepers in Martha's Vineyard to landscaping contractors in Arkansas, businesses are beseeching Congress to raise the ceiling on the number of visas for seasonal workers.
With this year's limit of 66,000 already reached, the employers are pressing for an immediate increase. Otherwise, many of the companies say, their businesses will be in jeopardy -- and so will the jobs of many Americans who also work for those businesses.
''Six hundred to 700 American jobs are at stake if I can't get the six foreign technicians that I need,'' said Larry Nelson, the president of Great Northern Sea Products. The company employs Japanese specialists during the summer at processing plants in Alaska to grade and sort salmon roe for sale in Japan.
Employers began writing panicked letters to members of Congress last month after the Department of Homeland Security clamped off this year's program of H-2B temporary visas for foreign workers, announcing it had reached the 66,000 limit, six months before the end of the fiscal year of 2004. “


We are creating the “illegal immigrants” by listening to the “Nationalist anti-immigrant groups.”

A Shortage of Seasonal Workers Is Feared - New York Times

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So it comes as a surprise that America's immigration system keeps throwing roadblocks in their way and the way of others who want to be like them.

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Why should it be a surprise? That is probably what I find most difficult to understand. The fact that we want people to come here LEGALLY rather than ILLEGALLY shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. The fact that we want to enforce our laws shouldn't be surprising to anyone.

What should be surprising to any reader is that someone would have the chutzpah to assume that he should have a free run of this country if he's coming here illegally. I find it absolutely stunning that these three illegals (and others like them) think they have some sort of basic right to violate our borders just because they feel like it, and that they should evince surprise when the majority of honest Americans want that practice to stop. The presumption of a "right" to cross our border that these people have is amazing to me. Don't you find that to be a problem, DC?

No this isn't a new problem. Illegal immigration is a very old problem. But it has now reached epidemic proportions. (11 million definitely qualifies as an epidemic) And it needs to be dealt with, sooner rather than later.

We are not creating illegal immigrants. THEY create themselves by crossing the border illegally. It is simply a question of whether we are going to allow it to continue uncontrolled, or whether we are do something about it. But we are no more at fault for this than we are at fault for terrorists flying planes into the WTC. The people who commit illegal acts are responsible for their actions, not us.

Also, note that your second article is talking about increasing the number of visas to bring workers here LEGALLY. I have no problem with that. Again, I am against ILLEGAL immigration, not legal immigration.

Elliot

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

Why should it be a surprise? That is probably what I find most difficult to understand. The fact that we want people to come here LEGALLY rather than ILLEGALLY shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. The fact that we want to enforce our laws shouldn't be surprising to anyone.

What should be surprising to any reader is that someone would have the chutzpah to assume that he should have a free run of this country if he's coming here illegally. I find it absolutely stunning that these three illegals (and others like them) think they have some sort of basic right to violate our borders just because they feel like it, and that they should evince surprise when the majority of honest Americans want that practice to stop. The presumption of a "right" to cross our border that these people have is amazing to me. Don't you find that to be a problem, DC?

No this isn't a new problem. Illegal immigration is a very old problem. But it has now reached epidemic proportions. (11 million definitely qualifies as an epidemic) And it needs to be dealt with, sooner rather than later.

We are not creating illegal immigrants. THEY create themselves by crossing the border illegally. It is simply a question of whether we are going to allow it to continue uncontrolled, or whether we are do something about it. But we are no more at fault for this than we are at fault for terrorists flying planes into the WTC. The people who commit illegal acts are responsible for their actions, not us.

Also, note that your second article is talking about increasing the number of visas to bring workers here LEGALLY. I have no problem with that. Again, I am against ILLEGAL immigration, not legal immigration.

Elliot

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Your reading and comprehension annoys me; you are so anxious to rant on with the nationalist rhetoric you missed the fact that the three illegal men (As you called them) were here on H2B visas, and so in fact were not illegals. They also said they would not come here illegally, and the employer said he would not hire illegals. So much for clarity of thought.:)

You are correct, I did misread the article. My apologies.

But I don't see how this creates a problem. I am not in favor of ending the temporary worker visa program. As you have said, we need those workers. What I am against is people coming here illegally to do those jobs that these LEGAL immigrants (or American citizens) would and should be doing.

We're not really disagreeing with each other. You are saying that we should make the temporary visa system work more easily. I agree. But that has no impact whatsover on what I am saying, which is that we need to stop the flow of ILLEGAL immigrants. Both of these points are true, and neither one contradicts the other.

Where we seem to be disagreeing is with regard to two points: 1) How big is the problem, and 2) what methods should we use to enforce the borders. Those two issues are open for debate.

Sorry about the misunderstanding. You are correct, I wasn't reading it carefully. I'll try to do better next time.

Elliot

Thank you Elliot:
Yeah, I don't think we are very far apart on most matters. I agree, those do appear to be the only points of contention.

YouTube - We Are the World - Lionel Richie, Tina Turner, Jackson
Sorry, it was getting to serious in here for me... woahoahoah!

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Originally Posted by startover22

YouTube - We Are the World - Lionel Richie, Tina Turner, Jackson
Sorry, it was getting to serious in here for me...woahoahoah!

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Well, if you believe it is too serious there is the option…just walk on by

I have really been reading all the way through... I just wanted to lighten your guys' day. That's all. I do appreciate all the different views on politics and the different discussions, I just notice that it gets pretty heated with the name calling and bashing...
Just a little sunshine... Dark Crow... close your eyes, if it's too bright!
I am still thinking on my take with this ILLEGAL immigration thing... if we are going to stop it, we are going to have to put our humanity away for a while. Sad but true... :(

How about we designate them as an "unlawful Enemy combatant”.

Naw, what we need to do is get the damn list of all that are leagal, and then start form there... They have every right to be here...
I am not real into these types of conversations, but I really think both sides are very sad sides... ours and theirs. If I lived somewhere, and I couldn't feed my family or anything to that extreme, and there was a place I could go to make sure that is done, HELL yes I am going to do it!
So I really do feel for them... I respect the immigrants that come legally, but for some, that is just not an option. The problem really needs to start where their homeland is! I guess that is where I would start!

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Originally Posted by startover22

Naw, what we need to do is get the damn list of all that are leagal, and then start form there....They have every right to be here....
I am not real into these types of conversations, but I really think both sides are very sad sides...ours and theirs. If I lived somewhere, and I couldn't feed my family or anything to that extreme, and there was a place I could go to make sure that is done, HELL yes I am gonna do it!
So I really do feel for them.....I respect the immigrants that come legally, but for some, that is just not an option. The problem really needs to start where their homeland is!! I guess that is where I would start!

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I agree and there is a movement that advocates capital investments in the southern hemisphere for bioenergy farms that would allow for economic growth, as well as less oil consumption in the more industrialized countries.

I guess the question is really... How do we get it started with out a bunch of corruption!

I've been reading this thread for a while and I'd agree, any fix to this problem has to start with making staying in the country of their birth a better place. If people can find jobs where they are they won't enter another coutnry illegally.

I still think the whole thing about illegal immigrants voting is ridiculous. I understand that with the current ID laws it's possible in New York (and maybe other places) but how many illegal immigrants are actually going to follow politics and try to vote? It seems like it's just another scare tactic to make people hate illegal immigrants more "they are screwing up our elections"... okay where is the hard data on the number of illegal immigrants that go vote?

I don't think there is even any hard data as to how many there are in the U.S.

You all make very good arguments. I do agree that issuing a driver's license to an illegal entitles them to the same rights as U.S. citezens. I don't think that should be done but at this point, illegal immigrants have the same rights as americans and if not more in some cases-- or so it sure seems that way. What can we do about it?