The Big Picture: On immigration, conservatives need to give Bush a break

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ^ | May 21, 2006 | Jack Kelly

[org.whodat]

Medicare and Social Security are going broke chiefly because there aren't enough workers paying into the systems to support beneficiaries. Unless millions of new workers can be found to pay the payroll tax, the retirement of the baby boom generation will bust both programs.

Yes sir, and thirty million people with sixth grade education, half of which will be on welfare, sure is going to speed thins right along. Fool!

[WOSG]

"Are you aware that the Republicans don't have a filibuster-proof majority and the DEMOCRATS were the ones who obstructed every time the Republicans tried to do anything about social security, taxes, etc?"

"Nonsense. Frist and the GOP leadership can use Senate rules to prevent poison-pill amendments,"

FWIW, I called Sen chambliss and found out that he supports ending birthright citizenship; I asked if such an amendment was going to be made to the Senate bill and was told it wasnt. So apparently, this was considered a poison-pill to the RINO-Dem immigration bill. sigh.

[WOSG]

"Truth to tell, the likes of Michelle Malkin, Laura Ingraham, Ann Coulter and the kick-them-all-out conservatives sound every bit as nutty as Randi Rhodes and the impeach-Bush liberals."

cite please?
http://michellemalkin.com/immigration/

and maybe you should Rush to that list ...
"Folks, I know, it's getting worse by the day, and it's inexplicable. It doesn't make any sense. What are these 18 Republicans doing? What is so difficult to understand about this in terms of the smart, sensible thing to do here? The first thing is the security of the border, and to have 18 Republicans, "Oh, nope, can't put that in there." Maybe they didn't like the fact that we can't do anything else until the border is secure. Well, what is wrong with that?" - Rush Limbaugh

AND SENATOR SESSIONS AND SENATOR CORNYN!
http://blog.vdare.com/archives/2006/05/20/required-week-end-reading-sessions-reveals-senate-punting-on-immigration-bill/#more-1278


"Conservatives can't elect national candidates without attracting a sizable percentage of the moderates, and lately conservative rhetoric has been off-putting in the extreme to fence-sitters."

Nonsense, the rhetoric that is offputting is Bush's rhetoric on immigration!!! Which is lower in the polls, Bush approval or approval to build a fence? Polls shows consistently that desire for lower immigration levels and opposition to amnesty is widely supported and cuts across conservative/moderate/liberal lines.

example:
66% of moderates like the House approach:
http://www.cis.org/articles/2006/2006poll.html

[quidnunc]

WOSG wrote: FWIW, I called Sen chambliss and found out that he supports ending birthright citizenship; I asked if such an amendment was going to be made to the Senate bill and was told it wasnt. So apparently, this was considered a poison-pill to the RINO-Dem immigration bill. sigh.

THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

-snip-

Article XIV.

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

[isrul]

is he sayibg these uneducated people, doing menial jobs for crap wages will save Social Security, Medicare and be Mexico's number one source of revenue, too? Wow! Who Knew?

[org.whodat]

I'm not a damn fool?.

I'd say that was a matter of opinion and some may tend to disagree.

[nicmarlo]

The No. 1 source of revenue for Mexico is remittances from Mexicans working in the United States. Threatening those remittances helps Mr. Obrador. Regularizing them helps Mr. Calderon. We should not institute a major domestic program primarily to aid a foreign ally. But a guest-worker program can benefit both our economy and our security.

more screed from sell-out America firsters.

[janetgreen]

We should not institute a major domestic program primarily to aid a foreign ally. But a guest-worker program can benefit both our economy and our security.

More Mexican propaganda they're trying to shove down our throats. (We just can't survive without these people)

WE ALREADY HAVE A GUESTWORKER PROGRAM, it's called work visa, but you won't hear anyone talking about that, ESPECIALLY our fearless leader, the first Mexican president of the U.S.

[WOSG]

"President Bush has said the right things about enforcement. He'd better mean them, or there will be hell to pay. Voters in Herndon, Va., tossed out the mayor and town council because they supported an employment center for illegals. Rep. Tom Osborne, the Cornhuskers' football coach during their glory years, was an icon in Nebraska, but lost a gubernatorial primary this month because he backed a bill providing college tuition breaks for illegals. ...

Anger shouldn't blind us to opportunity. What to do about the 11 million to 12 million illegals already here is understandably contentious. But the key issue is how to keep more illegals from coming in."

Well, it wont be through another amnesty/legalization, for sure!

"The surprisingly large vote in the Senate Wednesday for a border fence indicates the Osborne example has raised the consciousness of even many Democrats. The political atmosphere has never been better for enactment of meaningful enforcement measures. That atmosphere is unlikely to improve if we kick this can down the road to a future, perhaps Democratic, Congress. "

Good. Meaningful enforcement measures. Good idea!

But let me ask you - who is proposing them? They are in the Sensenbrenner bill!!!

It seems he is whining that Michelle Malkin is not trusting Bush even when Bush manages to produce 5,000 National Guards. BFD on the Guard... the Sensenbrenner Bill has 700,000 law enforcement resources made available, by getting state and local law enforcement involved and assisting in coordination on how we enforce immigration law.
President's response? He wrongly insists on legalization/amensty instead of supporting this.

It is time that we as conservatives put our differences aside and got behind a unified message here ...
1) NO AMNESTY ... NO CITIZENSHIP for illegal immigrants except through the same channels of immigration that all legal immigrants have to use today
2) Secure the border
3) Get employment verification working 100% and enforce employers that violate laws against hiring illegal immigrants
4) Create enough legal avenues for employment-sponsored immigration so we can wean employers off illegal immigrant labor; this may include new visa like temp worker visa
5) Get state and local law enforcement to help enforce the law
6) streamline deportation and end catch-and-release

[nicmarlo]

WE ALREADY HAVE A GUESTWORKER PROGRAM, it's called work visa, but you won't hear anyone talking about that, ESPECIALLY our fearless leader, the first Mexican president of the U.S.

Nope, because "truth" isn't the main course and "facts" aren't on the side!

[Luke21]

"As Paul Greenberg says, I'm a conservative, but I'm not a damn fool about it."

Great choice. You quote Clinton's favorite wink wink columnist from his favorite newspaper. The Clinton Administration was the best thing ever to happen to Greenberg, who's a squishy moderate at best. And as for the ADG, they sold the rag from street vending machines in downtown Washington when Clinton was prez. I saw them myself.

Who you gonna quote next? Safire? He voted for Clinton too.

[WOSG]

the XIV Amendment says ...

"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States"

Now, let me ask you... A Mexican woman crosses the border at 11am and arrives at 1pm in border-town hospital, in labor.

She has no legal visa.

She gives birth at 5pm that day, having been a Mexican citizen her entire life and on American soil 6 hours, with no legal right to be here.

Is that woman "subject to the jurisdiction" under the meaning of that clause in the XIVth?
Are you aware that diplomats having children are *NOT* US citizens? or that American Indians had no birthright citizenship (or citizenship at all) until 1924, so this in no way implies all children merely born on our soil are citizens. Are you aware of that?

The original intent was not to include aliens and foreigners in the category of those seeking citizenship;

"This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. "
- Senator Jacob Merritt Howard of Michigan

See:
http://www.fairus.org/site/PageServer?pagename=research_research65c8?&printer_friendly=1

the intent was to avoid two classes of citizenship akin to eg Russian serfdom, so that America wouldn't have defacto slavery without de jure slavery.
A 19th century case, the Elk case, clarified that birthright citizenship was tied to the fact of the parents having allegiance to the United States:

Court opinion said:
"The evident meaning of [the jurisdiction phrase] is not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction, and owing them direct and immediate allegiance. Indians born within the territorial limits of the United States … although in a geographical sense born in the United States, are no more ‘born in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof’ within the meaning of the [Citizenship Clause], than the children of subjects of any foreign government born within the domain of that government… "


"In Elk, the Supreme Court was true to the meaning of the Citizenship Clause, both as its drafters wrote it and, from the Senate debate, as they evidently meant it. The opinion makes clear that the status of the parents of a child born within the territory of the United States determines whether or not the child is eligible for U.S. citizenship. To qualify the child for citizenship, his parents must be “completely subject” to the jurisdiction of the United States and must owe “direct and immediate” allegiance to the United States. "

Any child born to an illegal alien has parents that are citizens of another country and thus are not 'subject to the jurisdiction thereof'.
Since the 14th Amendment clearly specifies Congressional power to enact legislation to enforce the 14th Amendment, then Congress can delineate the boundaries of citizenship, within the confines of the jurisdiction clause. To wit:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c107:H.R.190:

Changing to a system where we don't give automatic citizenship to children born of foreigners here with legal visa or on tourist visas is a common-sense reform that would end the practice of foreign women coming to the U.S. to have American citizen babies. My wife is a legal immigrant, and she is aware of many cases of exactly that within her own community; pregnant women come here on tourist visas to have a child. For many countries, it's like getting into a club. The above scenario I cited at the beginning is not a mere hypothetical, it happens every hour in American border areas. That is why $1 billion in Federal funding had to be appropriated for border hospitals, a large portion of it for ob/gyn services. (thanks, Sen Cornyn)

[quidnunc]

WOSG wrote: Now, let me ask you... A Mexican woman crosses the border at 11am and arrives at 1pm in border-town hospital, in labor. She has no legal visa. She gives birth at 5pm that day, having been a Mexican citizen her entire life and on American soil 6 hours, with no legal right to be here. Is that woman "subject to the jurisdiction" under the meaning of that clause in the XIVth?

Her baby is and is therefore a citizen.

Are you aware that diplomats having children are *NOT* US citizens?

That's be cause diplomats and their families have diplomatic immunity and therefore aren't subject to the jurisdiction of the US.

[VxH]

"Medicare and Social Security are going broke "

 

Social Security is a ponzi scheme.   The last ones in on a ponzi scheme always lose.   Always.

 

Do your really think that, once these highly ethnocentric immigrants obtain sufficient political numbers, they will tolerate the financing of the "gringos" retirements at their expense?

 

Take a look at Santa Ana and Los Angeles and do the math.  

 

When the demographics change for the rest of the country, you can kiss this fantasy about the funding of Social Security good bye.

[WOSG]

WOSG wrote: Now, let me ask you... A Mexican woman crosses the border at 11am and arrives at 1pm in border-town hospital, in labor. She has no legal visa. She gives birth at 5pm that day, having been a Mexican citizen her entire life and on American soil 6 hours, with no legal right to be here. Is that woman "subject to the jurisdiction" under the meaning of that clause in the XIVth?"

"Her baby is and is therefore a citizen."

That's circular logic. The question is the jurisdictional basis of that. The woman giving birth is a foreigner with no attachments to the US. Her situation is no different from the diplomat, who is also tied to the foreign country. This woman's child will *also* be a Mexican citizen. The interpretatin you give is the opposite to the original intent of the author of the clause.

There is a strong case to be made that Congress has Constitutional power to clarify this via legislation,
By its section 5 powers under the XIVth. the Congress can and should clarify this rule. It's not good public policy to give incentives for illegal border crossing women to have babies in the U.S. on taxpayer dime.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/GovernmentReform/wm925.cfm

"Although the language of the majority opinion in Wong Kim Ark is certainly broad enough to include the children born in the United States of illegal as well as legal immigrants, there is no case in which the Supreme Court has explicitly held that this is the unambiguous command of the Fourteenth Amendment."


Another example of the awkwardness of the status quo:

http://www.mnforsustain.org/immg_case_against_birthright_citizenship_hamdi.htm

This is about Hamdi

... but there is this snippet:
"South Koreans have created a birth tourism industry. As the Los Angeles Times reported in 2002, Korean tour operators fly Korean mothers into Los Angeles and other American cities, there to give birth —in Korean-owned clinics with Korean staff— to an "American.""

my wife, I mentioned, btw, is Korean-born, and knows about this through the community grapevine. it's a well-known 'trick' for the many koreans who wish a better life for their kids. Just one of the absurdities of birthright citizenship in the modern age.

[janetgreen]

Her baby is and is therefore a citizen.

This must be true ONLY for Mexicans, quidnunc. My grandson was born here in California, his mother was and is a Canadian citizen, his father is an American citizen.

If he wants to become an American citizen, he must apply for citizenship. He also must have a passport to even visit the United States.

Why are Mexicans automatically American citizens if they are born here, yet Canadians aren't?

[T.L.Sink]

That's simply because Bush has a Democratic plan that liberals love -- amnesty and open borders!

[GregH]

thanks okidoke :) .

[GregH]

" Create enough legal avenues for employment-sponsored immigration so we can wean employers off illegal immigrant labor; this may include new visa like temp worker visa "


Thats what President Bush had in mind when he suggested a guset worker program but some of the so called conservatives attacked him over his plan then because of their opposition to such a temporary visa program. It is difficult to please some on the hard side of this immigration issue.

[tonycavanagh]

re :The No. 1 source of revenue for Mexico is remittances from Mexicans working in the United States. Threatening those remittances helps Mr. Obrador. Regularizing them helps Mr. Calderon.

I think this is the main reason