The false dilemma behind the Bush Amnesty

January 17th, 2004 | Sabertooth

[Marine Inspector]

I believe he is in the process of doing something about that currently..

Keep believing. It's good to have faith, even if it's missed placed.

Marine Inspector

[arete]

I mention it here because I think that Bush's Amnesty plan is really just a smoke-screen to allowing foreigners (no limits) into our country for employment. This must delight all of his close friends and family in Corporate America, as it means lower wages across the board for every hard-working American.

You have the smoke and mirrors right. Treas Sec Snow promised (bet his reputation on it, he did -- LOL, what reputation?) huge new job creation this year. What better way to pump up the BLS (or is that now "Workforce Security") numbers than to have all those off the books jobs suddenly start showing up in the stats. Watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!

Richard W.

[spodefly]

Great work ST.

BIG BTTT!!!

[txdoda]

You mean that immigration would be the same or lower if that bill hadn't permitted employers such as myself to determine if employee applicates were legal (for real, without forged papers)?!>>>>>>

This 'verification' bill will indeed help *honest* employers, who play by the rules.

Many say it's hard to charge the *dis-honest* employers, because the forged paperwork is so good.

If this 'verification' bill had been made mandatory, dis-honest employers could then be charged with not verifying the SS #'s, & FINED accordingly.

[dcwusmc]

Hey, bro. How are you this fine Saturday?

Tom Tancredo in '04 fer shore!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[arete]

The only difference between the Republicans and the Democrats is that the Democrats want the US ruled by a combination of national and international despots while the Republicans will settle for tyranny by just national despots. The end result is the same - the destruction of our freedom.

The Nazis hated the communists too. The choice of the two party system is always the same -- do you want to be shot or hung?

Richard W.

[Marine Inspector]

If you fast track the visa apps of people using the system now in place with a job in the US then many will self deport once the word gets out.

Agreed. Let them get out and get in line like the rest.

Most will, IMO.

Marine Inspector

[Amerigomag]

Do you really think that the American people are going to stand for the adverse economic impact of all this

Yes and here's just one example of why.

Right now approximately one third of California's public schools are populated by the consequences of 50 years of unregulated immigration. That's over $9,000 per student in tax money being shelled out needlessly each year and that number grows yearly.

Nothing we do will even approach the billions being wasted just this year in California alone. Mutiplyed nationally those unnecessary expenses and we could probably fund an enforcement activity approaching that which we undertook in Iraq.

[Marine Inspector]

How are you this fine Saturday?

Doing great.

We have 20 officers at my port. Over half are Republicans and about half of those are hardcore republicans. Not one will vote for Bush in 2004.

Most will write in Tancredo, Keys or someone else.

Semper Fi,

Marine Inspector

[Roscoe]

868,453 (83%) of the apprehended aliens stated they were seeking employment.

Incredible.

[pawdoggie]

The bureaucracy necessary for enforcement of our immigration laws would be similar, I imagine, to that necessary to run the background checks on 8 to 12 million Illegals and process them for the Bush Amnesty.

Who says I'm in favor of the "Bush Amnesty", or the creation of a massive new bureaucracy in any case?

Nor would there be a new class of criminal employers, just enforcement against the existing ones.

First of all, read the Fifth Amendment, you have to be convicted to be a criminal. Assuming that the "existing" laws are adequate to obtain convictions, especially in the areas of prospective employee identification and proving employer intent to hire illegals, you're still creating a "new class" of criminals whenever you start enforcing laws that previously went unenforced. If you don't believe me, just speak to the Mothers Against Drunk Driving. I think you grossly underestimate the potential number of US citizens you might snare in your employer dragnet.

Nowhere do I suggest incarceration for millions, which suggests to me you didn't read carefully.

You're right, you were vague about what happens to "deportees" who become repeat offenders, whether they're "self-deportees" or not.

Do you really think that the American people are going to stand for the adverse economic impact of all this ("short term", i.e. 2-5 years though it might be)? Yeah, I think it will be a blip that hardly goes noticed, though unemployment will decrease, as well as welfare costs. I sincerely doubt that our economy is as dependent on Illegals as apologists suggest.

And you have some science/statistics to back that up?

Where, in any known party or walk of American life are you going to find the politician/leader who can "sell" your proposal, and where will you find the legislators to implement it? Since the vast majority of Americans don't support Amnesty by any name, I think you're overestimating the difficulty here.

The majority of Americans don't favor drug legalization either, so the War on Drugs should have been won long ago. Unfortunately, the American people (at least at this time) won't support the kind of politically sensitive and Draconian measures it would take to stop the drug trade, or to end illegal immigration.

[international american]

"So, the trick now is to get President Bush reelected, while simultaneously defeating his Amnesty, for good."

That is indeed the trick....we need to be proactive on this one

[supercat]

It seems to me, as I've suggested elsewhere, that Bush may be trying to use a little strategery here. Illegal aliens currently have a competitive advantage in the workplace because they can be relied upon not to squeal on employers who violate labor laws. Bush is saying people can come here and stay legally iff they can show that they have an employer who's willing to go on record as hiring them. But employers who intend to skirt labor laws aren't going to do so with an employee of record.

So now what will happen will be that the undocumented workers will split into two classes: (1) those who would be able to show that they have a job lined up, but who have no competitive advantage over citizens or permanent residents, or (2) those who aren't willing to show that they have a job lined up. Having made the first option available may make it politically much easier to deport people of the second group.

[Triple Word Score]

Terror and taxes are so crucial you can't dismiss them. Only Lieberman promises to be reasonably effective on the first count, and not one Dem will even keep the present very modest tax cuts. Lieberman can't win. I'm hoping he'll Mean What He Says enough to give his endorsement to GWB when he does drop out.

You say your vote is the President's to lose, but the system we have is hardly going to give you a more palatable alternative.

Focus on Congress and what is actually going to be written into law and funded. Our President will sign any politically-viable legislation that actually addresses the problem. Whether or not such legislation will actually get funded and supported depends on grassroots pressure, not a President's opinion one way or the other.

I'm proud of our President for being willing to confront the problem instead of continuing to pass the buck. I happen to support his proposal personally, but I see that it is politically dead on arrival. What has to happen now is leadership at the Congressional level, and that comes about when voters have had enough of the game-playing and delays

[Magnum44]

I tend to agree with your sentiments, both with what you agree with GWB on, and with what you disagree with him on. I struggle to justify his actions wrt the illegal alien issue, for two reasons. First, the alternative viable candidates offer only worse solutions, and second, I do believe that some things this administration would like to do have to be dealt with in such a way that the generally anti-GOP, anti-Bush media do not brainwash the sheeple into a DEM victory during this time of war next November.

One thing that has not been mentioned in all the media hype about the guest visa proposal is that bringing hundreds of thousands of workers into the system means those people who were hiding their funds in matresses have incentive to invest that in the market, via retirement alternatives to Social Security.

GWB is supposed to try to resurrect the privatized Social Security program at his SOTU speech. Suppose the social security program he intends for guest workers is privatized? It becomes a vehicle to get rid of the current redistribution tax, and an incentive to invest in the market.

I have a problem with bringing foriegn workers into SS (of course I personally would opt out and relinquish all my contributions if I could stop pay FICA today), but I have no problem with mexican workers investing in the same mutual fund IRA's, 401k's, and other retirement mechanisms available out there, and collecting the dividends upon their retirement. In my mind, that is good for the US economy as well as any worker, domestic or foriegn, who contributes.

So if I have "kool-aide" thoughts, its that there may be linkage between these two issues that through stratery, the admin is thinking about, but just not advertising yet.

Please note, my support of this is concept contingent upon the program being a guest visa program, not an amnesty program. But I acknowledge those who point out that the illegals are already here, and politically, it would be impossible to simply deport them all, what with Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw broadcasting every night into our living rooms the terrible impact it will have on their lives once they are returned to third world conditions.

[Revel]

Here are some useful links:


Official Citizenship of prison inmates:

CITIZENSHIP

United States: 123,088 (71.0%)

Mexico: 28,421 (16.4%)

Colombia: 3,659 (2.1%)


Cuba: 2,492 (1.4%)

Dominican Republic: 3,432 (2.0%)

Other/Unknown: 12,074 (7.0%)
http://www.bop.gov/fact0598.html#Citizenship


"Criminal aliens—non-citizens who commit crimes—are a growing threat to public safety and national security, as well as a drain on our scarce criminal justice resources. In 1980, our federal and state prisons housed fewer than 9,000 criminal aliens. By the end of 1999, these same prisons housed over 68,000 criminal aliens.1 Today, criminal aliens account for over 29 percent of prisoners in Federal Bureau of Prisons facilities and a higher share of all federal prison inmates.(2) These prisoners represent the fastest growing segment of the federal prison population. Over the past five years, an average of more than 72,000 aliens have been arrested annually on drug charges alone."
http://www.fairus.org/ImmigrationIssueCenters/ImmigrationIssueCenters.cfm?ID=1252&c=17


Some of the most violent criminals at large today are illegal aliens. Yet in cities where the crime these aliens commit is highest, the police cannot use the most obvious tool to apprehend them: their immigration status. In Los Angeles, for example, dozens of members of a ruthless Salvadoran prison gang have sneaked back into town after having been deported for such crimes as murder, assault with a deadly weapon, and drug trafficking. Police officers know who they are and know that their mere presence in the country is a felony. Yet should a cop arrest an illegal gangbanger for felonious reentry, it is he who will be treated as a criminal, for violating the LAPD’s rule against enforcing immigration law.
http://www.city-journal.org/html/14_1_the_illegal_alien.html


Even legal immigrants don't have jobs- that is another reason why they are angry about this:
http://www.cis.org/articles/2003/back503.html

[Marine Inspector]

Border Patrol union calls plan 'a slap in the face'

By Joe Cantlupe
COPLEY NEWS SERVICE
January 13, 2004

WASHINGTON - President Bush's proposal to grant temporary legal status to millions of illegal immigrants has many U.S. Border Patrol agents grumbling and bracing for a possible surge in illegal immigration. "Everybody thinks it's a slap in the face," said T.J. Bonner, a San Diego-based agent and head of the National Border Patrol Council, which represents 10,000 agents.

Bush's plan would create a temporary worker program for undocumented immigrants already in the United States and for people in other countries who have been offered jobs here. Bush said they would not receive special consideration for permanent residence or citizenship.

The Border Patrol union, which doesn't like the proposal, has sent a letter to its members urging them to speak out about it.

"Regardless of how you feel about President Bush, I think most of us would agree that his proposal is a slap in the face to anyone who has ever tried to enforce the immigration laws of the U.S.," wrote John Frecker, a vice president of the National Border Patrol Council. "It implies that the country really wasn't serious about it in the first place, in spite of what you were told about 'the big picture.' "

Border Patrol Agent Bud Tuffly, who has patrolled the desert in Arizona for nearly 20 years, recalled the surge of illegal immigrants who crossed the border in advance of Congress' landmark 1986 amnesty.

"We saw the numbers skyrocket and all this naturally encourages them to come across," said Tuffly, a union representative in Tucson, Ariz. "You have to do your job. It's very demoralizing to do your job. We have rocks thrown at us daily. We had a guy from Yuma who died. Why?"

In announcing the proposal, Bush administration officials said a key factor in accepting foreigners into the program would be whether they already had a job in the United States - or the promise of one if they are living outside the United States.

While some Homeland Security officials privately echoed concerns that the proposal might trigger an influx, the agency's official reaction was more muted.

"It's premature to comment on any proposed legislation concerning immigration reform," said Mario Villarreal, a spokesman for Homeland Security's border enforcement branch.

David A. Martin, a former general counsel for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, said he believes Border Patrol agents "have a legitimate concern" about a possible rush of illegal immigration while the president's plan is being considered.

"The proposal is fraught with perverse incentives," said Martin, a professor at the University of Virginia. "There is an incentive for people to come in and establish some relationship with an employer. And there hasn't been a cutoff date under the president's plan. I can see the concern that the Border Patrol agents have."

In the past, shifts in immigration policy have triggered rushes.

In 1993, then-President Clinton agreed to consider asylum requests of Haitians interdicted at sea. The announcement was followed by a large number of Haitians taking to the sea in leaky, overloaded boats and rafts in hopes of getting asylum interviews.

Later, the Clinton administration responded to the 1998 devastation of Hurricane Mitch in Central America by granting temporary protected status to Hondurans and Nicaraguans who could prove they were living illegally in the United States before the hurricane. While no mass immigration crisis occurred, border agents reported an increase in the number of Central Americans being caught at the border shortly after the hurricane.

In 1986, Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which granted amnesty to 2.7 million illegal immigrants and introduced penalties for employers who knowingly hired undocumented workers.

Border agents reported a large surge in illegal crossing in the months leading up to enactment as people sought to get into the United States in time to apply for the amnesty, even though many of their claims were fraudulent.

Although the 1986 act was designed to stem the illegal flow, it didn't work. The estimated illegal population was 6 million then. Today, it is estimated to be between 8 million and 12 million.

Retired Border Patrol Agent Mike Cutler, who has testified repeatedly before Congress about homeland security issues, called Bush's plan "lunacy, crazy, madness, foolish, naive."

"In 1986, we had the first amnesty, it was supposed to be a one-shot deal," Cutler said. "People came out of the shadows."

Deborah Meyers, an analyst with the Migration Policy Institute, said she doesn't expect a significant increase in the population of illegal immigrants.

"The program is very open and very broad - for any willing worker for any willing employer," she said. "I don't think we'll see a lot more illegal immigration. But things still have to be worked out."

[international american]

These stats have been posted here at least 10 times, but the naysayers just ignore them. Sad!!

[Revel]

Probably. I had someone yesterday tell me that 29% number was made up. I went looking for the top link and found the stats On a government website. They will probably still denigh it.

[international american]

California has at least 30 cities which have become third world ghettos....Too many freepers are unaware of what is happening in the western states.