Posted on 01/30/2013 4:23:06 AM PST by IbJensen
There. I said it.
You’d be surprised how long it has taken to say this. I’ve let multiple friends vet the various drafts of posts I’ve written on this and they all wind up arguing with each other over the details. Is it amnesty or isn’t it? Should we give a path to citizenship or not? We are getting in the weeds when the basics will do.
I think this plan is warmed over McCain-Kennedy and will do nothing to solve the problem. I say this as someone to the left of much of the readership here at RedState and the conservative base.
The GOP was smart to put Marco Rubio as the face of the plan because many of us like him personally, support him still, and consequently don’t want to seem critical.
But the plan makes the actual problem of immigration more difficult to solve.
As Ben Domenech noted:
The McCain-Graham+Rubio/Flake reworked proposal released yesterday is another example of wrongheadedness: The senators would increase the scope of government instead of liberty, make normalization contingent upon border security (which just sets up another fight between interest groups on the border — Republican says it’s not secure, Democrat says it is, etc.), and create employer provisions which 1) forces employers to prove a negative and 2) turns them into criminals if they can’t. Oh, I’m sure that won’t result in any profiling at all.
On the specific plan, for lack of legislation, it is clearly written by a group of men who seemingly love government, but do not love free markets, small businesses, or individuals. It is a plan based on faith in government, not free enterprise or the American people.
The plan creates several policy fictions to hide behind.
The first policy fiction is a secure border. The White House will claim the border is secure. The Republicans will claim it is not. The border will never be made impenetrable and we will proceed down this distracting, argumentative line to no end.
The second policy fiction is premised on the “jobs Americans won’t do” which is more accurately described as “jobs Americans won’t do at that price point.” Employers must prove that no American could be found to do the job the illegal alien would otherwise do. This is impossible, absurd, and turns employers to liars in the pursuit of running their business. The aggrieved can turn on the employers and potentially cost them all sorts of civil and criminal penalties.
The most significant policy fiction is premised on the idea of reform. The plan does nothing to address the black market for unskilled, low cost migrant work. It does nothing to deal with the long delays in the present immigration system. It does nothing to actually solve our immigration problems, but hides behind the construct of “comprehensive” reform. Along the way, it potentially adds more people to already overwhelmed entitlement programs, but then that too is another kicked can.
The desire to “just do something” overwhelms Washington too much. This immigration plan gives orgasmic relief to that desire, but in all the hype and show does nothing to address the real needs of employers and the hopes and dreams of those still longing to come to United States whose wait will now most likely be extended and grow even more complex.
Immigration is an issue that keeps hispanic voters from trusting the GOP. Many call it a “gateway” issue. I get that. But pandering in the name of a solution does not actually fix the problem. This is just another policy debate the Democrats can use to get the GOP to fight itself. The GOP should pivot to actually fixing the immigration problem, not just addressing the here and now.
I’ll go with what Mark Levin had to say last night.
‘Chacnes are good no plan will be approved by Congress.’
That’s my guess as well.
This author misses the point, I dont care if they want to come here to work but we cant afford them :
1) on government handouts, will they make the 47% the 55%?
2) Voting
What tax rates will they pay?
“Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it.”
A very true statement.
Regan gave blanket amnesty to illegals during his term and the result up to now is that millions more have come to this country because they were certain that another major amnesty would be granted in the future...and here it is!
Now, we repeat history again and after this amnesty many more millions will come across the border in order to be in place for them in the next 20 years or so.
Amnesty is simply WRONG! It is a “kick in the teeth” for those who played by the rules of legal citizenship in our country and those who are still in the legal immigration “pipeline.”
However, with the Brave New World Society, who plays by the rules anyway? That stupid old Constitution is nothing more than an outdated rule book and should be either thrown away or changed so that all may be happy and not weighted down by law. The morality of our society has already been destroyed so what the hell...........
Erickson, McCain, Graham, Rubio/Flake are not Conservatives in any sense, they are the worst sort of Republicans, worthless appeasers and should be run out of office or in Erickson’s case ridiculed as a fat fraud!
“It does nothing to deal with the long delays in the present immigration system. It does nothing to actually solve our immigration problems,..”
Why are there long delays? Could it be too many people are being let in, and we need to reduce the number of immigrants we let in to the country.
As to solving our immigration problems, it is simple: cut back on the number of immigrants let in, and vary the nations so not one nation or area of the world dominates.
This will allow new immigrants to assimilate rather than congregate in a region and drive out other races or ethnic groups, as is happening right now in southern California.
Sometimes the common sense route is right there in front of us and with a track record (as it has been done before here in this nation). What we have to avoid is doing a politically driven reform unsupported by the majority of citizens.
I was hoping the plan would not go past Congress, but I don’t know any more.
After only 3 Senators voted against John “Traitor” Kerry for Secretary of State I don’t trust any of them.
To me that was the most reprehensible act since Obamacare.
The Rats just want ten million new voters so they don’t have to rely on vote fraud so heavily. That last sham election really took all they had and they are scared they may not be able to continue to rely so heavily on fraud.
How come the USSR didn’t fool Reagan with their bad intentions, but Democrats in Congress did?
If the Democrats vote for it, you will know that its bad and gives us nothing for our side. Another Lucy with the football. Democrats won’t vote for anything unless it only benefits them and allows blame to be placed on Republicans. Its a one party system now.
Why is Rubio aligning himself with the McCain, Grahamnesty, Schumer, Menendez, Durbin criminal gang?
There cannot possibly be anything good behind this.
Right. There is nothing good about it at all.
The Republicrat Party is rudderless and laden with RINOs. There is no room in this tent full of fat pigs for the likes of a Conservative!
Tea Party!
The "rights" illegals enjoy as "undocumented migrants" are far too many to give up:
If using stolen ID, citizens can be found guilty of a felony, illegal aliens are not;
Other such crimes are not punished equally for citizens and non-citizens;
As for other government benefits, housing, food stamps, etc. illegal aliens seem to be doing quite well in that category already, healthcare is free now, dittos education for the kiddies, especially in the states that grant driver's licenses to illegal aliens for the DMV is where one also signs up for those benefits at the same time.
Lastly, as to those pesky voting "rights," all one needs is a driver's license, dittos voting, i.e. "Motor/Votor Laws!"
Fix legal immigration and cut off welfare benefits for illegals. Then go to a Swiss style system of citizenship. Problem solved in three steps.
Make no mistake, this is about staving off making draconian cuts to the large senior voting block by adding needed revenue. The added voters are just a bonus.
Any plan that does not include E-Verify is a fake plan.
I know or have known a lot of illegals (they somehow get licensed as asbestos workers in spite of their status). They all have been loyal to Mexico, and would have gone back on weekends if given the choice. I live in deep south TX. One guy told me how great Mexico is. I asked why he was here. “Oh, I can’t make a living there”.
The local asbestos enforcement inspector was asked how these illegals were able to qualify for licenses (several crews on licensed workers and supervisors were picked up from jobs and deported). He laughed and stated if not for the illegals (who are nearly the only ones who will do the work) there would be no asbestos abatement crews.
Anything the grand zero likes is bad for America.
If it's passed by Congress the Democrat Socialist Party gets millions of new voters to implement their welfare state utopia.
If it does not pass, he gets to blame Republicans with the objective being to have total control of the Legislative Branch in 2014.
Meanwhile, the Stupid Party "leaders" are just mosey-ing along seemingly without a care in the world while the rest of us watch our wonderful republic go down the tubes ...
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