Posted on 06/19/2012 5:55:13 AM PDT by raulgomez05
Hypothetically, if Marco Rubio were not an American citizen and could not provide food for his family, he says he would cross the border illegally to come to the United States.
While discussing immigration policy in his new memoir, An American Son, Rubio called for "common decency" in dealing with undocumented immigrants and said that if put in a similar position as those who are fleeing destitution, he would break the law, too.
"Many people who come here illegally are doing exactly what we would do if we lived in a country where we couldn't feed our families," Rubio writes in his book, which went on sale Tuesday. "If my kids went to sleep hungry every night and my country didn't give me an opportunity to feed them, there isn't a law, no matter how restrictive, that would prevent me from coming here."
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
Well, excuse me for not be a stickler for terminology about someone advocating for a foreign invasion of my country.
I have been aware of and against this invasion via illegal immigration since 1991 or so. The 1965 Immigration Act was also part of this evil.
Perhaps I should have used the word ‘jobless’ instead of starving.
“Perhaps I should have used the word ‘jobless’ instead of starving.”
“Mexico Unemployment Rate
The unemployment rate in Mexico was last reported at 5 percent in April of 2012. Historically, from 2000 until 2012, Mexico Unemployment Rate averaged 3.6400 Percent reaching an all time high of 5.9300 Percent in May of 2009 and a record low of 2.2200 Percent in January of 2004.”
“United States Unemployment Rate
The unemployment rate in the United States was last reported at 8.2 percent in May of 2012. Historically, from 1948 until 2012, the United States Unemployment Rate averaged 5.7800 Percent reaching an all time high of 10.8000 Percent in November of 1982 and a record low of 2.5000 Percent in May of 1953.”
Source: http://www.tradingeconomics.com/data-all-countries.aspx
Care to try again?
I don't think these are the compelling human stories to which Rubio was referring.
Care to try again?
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Yes, you have now totally convinced me that all of the illegals from Mexico are fat, happy, and employed, and are only coming to the US so they can go to Disneyland.
Do you really believe that the all time high unemployment rate in Mexico is (remember, an all time high) 5.9%?
“Mexico has no starvation.”
I read that roughly 85,000 people in Mexico died of malnutrition in the last year for which there is data, and millions more are severely affected by lack of food. Apparently, there is a multi-year drought in much of the country that is affecting some millions of people.
But even putting abject starvation aside, I see how many illegal immigrants live in my own area, and I agree with you, they are coming here to elevate their standard of living. But that “elevation” often comprises living 25, 30, 35 or more in a single house. Which means that what they came from was truly desperate, not far from life-threatening.
“At any rate we are a sovereign nation with defined borders and they should be prevented from crossing them illegally and this should have been done years ago.”
I agree. But it is OUR fault, or at least the fault of our government, that we don't enforce our own laws. It isn't the fault of folks who find themselves in desperate circumstances who come here for better that we don't enforce our own laws. As I said, it may be that there is no sin on the part of the truly desperate for trying to come here.
The sin is on our own government for not enforcing our own laws.
“We had very little illegal immigration in 1950. We should return to that.”
Actually, in the early 1950s, we had a serious problem with illegal immigration, especially from Mexico. It was severe enough that President Eisenhower initiated “Operation Wetback,” to remove illegal immigrants from the United States. Here's a little from the wiki article:
“In a letter to Senator J. William Fulbright, Eisenhower quoted a report in The New York Times that said, ‘The rise in illegal border-crossing by Mexican “wetbacks” to a current rate of more than 1,000,000 cases a year has been accompanied by a curious relaxation in ethical standards extending all the way from the farmer-exploiters of this contraband labor to the highest levels of the Federal Government.’”
Hmmm... sounds familiar.
sitetest
“I read that roughly 85,000 people in Mexico died of malnutrition in the last year...”
That should be:
“I read that roughly 85,000 people in Mexico died of malnutrition in the last decade...”
“Do you really believe that the all time high unemployment rate in Mexico is (remember, an all time high) 5.9%?”
You have other numbers to dispute that? Here’s another source:
Country 2000 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
Mexico 2.5 3.3 3.2 3.6 3.2 4 5.5 5.6
http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=mx&v=74
I didn’t mean to imply that you were advocating for the invasion. I mean Rubio is.
Wow. I simply don’t know what to say. A freeper touting government provided statistics as the be all and end all.
I have never seen that before.
If they have all the jobs and food they want - why are they coming here?
I didn’t tout them as the end all and be all. I asked if you have other numbers that contradict them. I offered two different sources. Put up or shut up.
“If they have all the jobs and food they want - why are they coming here?”
Maybe because they want to take advantage of the lopsided monetary situation in order to let their families back in Mexico, Ecuador, and Guatemala live like kings? Didn’t you ever wonder why every currency exchange has big signs saying “ENVIOS A MEXICO”? Most of them are sending money back, draining it out of our economy.
The only thing I could find to bring into question the Mexican reported unemployment rate was something from Wikipedia, and the footnote was a dead link. Kind of like bringing a knife to a gunfight.
It was a discussion of the methodology employed to do the calculation, and it did not appear to be quite as mathematically rigorous as the methodology employed here. It was compared to a Gallup poll. It certainly does not appear to be an apples to apples comparison.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1153/is_n11_v117/ai_16040951/
This article is not new by any stretch, but it does discuss some of the differences in the way unemployment is calculated differently in the 2 countries.
Well, so they game the statistics, probably quite a bit more than we do. I wouldn’t be surprised. Still, even if they’re all underemployed and struggling, it’s no excuse to be soft on illegal immigration. It’s just a reason to be firmer on enforcement.
Look at it this way, if you are surrounded by poor neighbors who are more than willing to walk into your house and take your stuff, do you leave the door unlocked, or do you build a big fence and get a guard dog? Letting them come in and rob you blind does nothing to help them in the long run, and will only end up creating one more poor household in the neighborhood.
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