A rare moment, indeed!Follow

Congrats on 3... oh. Nevermind.

Who knows, it might be the first generation of illegals causing the problems!

Ain't that just like a liberal.

Nah, really, I'm with you. Most of the Latinos I've spoken to assume there will be some sort of penalty for sneaking in illegally and most are willing to pay for it, they just don't want their families broken up. It's the sword hanging over their necks more than anything that's stressful, and it would just be good to know one way or the other.

I was being facetious, you ijut. The "second generation of illegals" aren't illegals anymore. We be citizens!

Hey flea, are you on welfare? Have you



?

Edited, May 18th 2007 12:02pm by Natdatilgnome

So you're against US citizens, not illegal immigrants. Get your gripes straight!Aside from the ones who are, I guess.

Impeach Bush!

No disagreement from me here. I've been saying that the whole guest worker program ideas floated by Bush were the right way to go for a couple years now. Both parties have done a great job at hindering that process though, so it's nice to see some movement on this finally.

I do find it amusing that both sides are bashing it on the radio as well (of course!). The Conservatives are going nuts over "It's amnesty!!!", while the Liberals are... well, they're mostly talking about how much Bush must be wrong because his own party doesn't agree with him (mostly).


I would have gone farther with the worker program then they got here though, but it's a start I suppose. The concern being that if the program doesn't actually provide a viable alternative to crossing the border illegally, then it wont actually address the problem (and will end up being "just another amnesty bill"). We'll see how things go. It's not nearly as comprehensive as I would have liked though.

Hah. I should turn off my filter every once in awhile...

There tend to be four sides to this issue, not just two. In broad terms, they're split up by party and whether one is from a border state or not (not that you can't have border state people with non-border state approaches and vice-versa. it just tends to work out that way).

Non-Borderstate folks tend to approach immigration purely from a legal standpoint. The Republicans say that the law says X number of people can come in, so all the extra people are breaking the law and need to be deported/punished/whatever. The Democrats tend to adopt the whole "open borders" argument saying that workers should be free to travel to wherever the work is. I honestly think both of those groups are nuts and simply don't understand the issue at all (guess where varus is?)


Borderstate folks tend to approach the issue as an economic one. Republicans recognize that as long as you've got a largish number of people who can increase their wages by 10x simply by moving across a border, no amount of fence or law will keep them out. Not by itself. Thus, we tend to see worker programs coming from that group (but usually opposed by everyone else). Democrats see the economics, but instead of trying to construct a worker program that duplicates the gap being filled by illegal immigrants already, they tend to try to push for "working wages" (significant increases to minimum wage) arguing that if you raise the wages then the demand for those lower skilled jobs will increase, US citizens will take those jobs and this will somehow prevent people from coming here illegally in the first place. I'm not sure how anyone thinks this idea works, but it's scary how often it's proposed.


I suppose there's actually a 5th group as well, but I really think it's an offshoot of the borderstate Dems group. These are the "punish big business" guys, who seem to just use illegal immigration to push stricter laws punishing businesses who hire illegal workers. I suspect this has more to do with the protection of unions and punishement of a traditional opponent of the left then anything else since it really has absolutely zero to do with immigration (and will have zero effect on it).


Yeah. They're broad catagories, and it's not like everyone fits into each one cleanly, but those are the positions I've typically seen expressed and the "groups" that I usually see expressing them. Of course, I've written this in such a way as to present my own personal views as the shining beacon of hope and goodness, but what did you expect? ;)

As a criticism against immigration reform from the Left? No, I can't say I have. Seriously.

*Shrug*