My, the editors at the Seattle Times are so grownup…
It will take time to produce bipartisan legislation that acknowledges America’s complicity in illegal immigration — industries from agriculture to construction to hospitality rely on an underground network of undocumented workers.
And, um, exactly what is it that persuades the Times’ editors that bipartisan legislation is even remotely possible on this issue, especially from a Republican caucus firmly committed to appealing to the worst, nativist instincts of its angry base?
I’m not saying that this isn’t a complicated issue, or that there aren’t legitimate arguments to be made from the other side of the aisle, just that there doesn’t appear to be anybody on the other side of the aisle willing to argue legitimately. Arizona is evidence of that. Bipartisanship just doesn’t produce that kind of craziness. Not in America.
And yet, for some reason, Democrats are supposed to “take time to produce bipartisan legislation.” You know, I suppose by reaching out to say, Sen. John McCain of Arizona.
Do we really have that much time?
But you left out the last and concluding sentence.
So, in conclusion, finding 2 Republican senators who will allow cloture on an immigration bill that includes a path to citizenship for undocumented aliens shall take time; about as much time as it shall take for hell to freeze over.
Somewhere Ronaldus Magnus cries.
Yeah, i forgot, we are supposed to roll over and give them all amnesty.
We did this in the 80’s , with gobs of promises to enforce the new laws.
Why don’t Dems propose a level of Mexican immigration that is lower than unlimited. Unlimited means US cities change radically, get poorer, get more crime. Measured (say on the order of immigration by Pakistanis, Indians or Chinese….leads to nice growth in our country.
The point in all this is “unlimited”…not good
So if one doesn’t think exactly like Goldy on the immigration issue, they are a terrorist?
Goldy,
The problem is that the Reprican actions in Az are going to polarize this issue.
While I too am sure that the Arizona law is intended to be racist, it seems to me that there are very good reasons to consider some sort of national identity card as a non-racist answer to the very real issue of illegal workers.
I must admit that I have probably employed illegals, if not directly then in the form of workers used by a contractor.
While I benefited from this, I also think this is very unfair to American workers. Requiring an identity card for employment would go a long way to making enforcement of legal immigration practical.
Identity cards have other good features. It would make great sense to replace passports and drivers licences within our own borders. There are obvious advantages in other areas from voting to flying.
The tea baggers and some libruls would, of course both onject but centralizing a card might elicit apoplexy in Glenn Beck.
The John McCain who yesterday blamed Obama for Arizona’s immigration bill?
Righton @2 said: “Why don’t Dems propose a level of Mexican immigration that is lower than unlimited….”
Currently the legal immigration quotas from Latin American countries are unrealstically low. If you wait to get in legally, then you will be waiting for most of your lifetime. This forces people to find ways to jump to the head of the line (marriage, etc.) which counts against the quotas anyway, pushing those waiting for visas even further away from ever actually seeing them.
In the meantime, there is a demand for cheap labor, lots of people just over the border willing to provide it, so naturally they are going to find a way to get across. At some point undocumented workers create their own demand for even more undocumented workers, as business owners relaize (or fear) that their competitors are gaining an unfair advantage by employing undocumented workers at sub-legal wages and working conditions. In response, more of them decide to hire illegals themselves (although they may do it through sub-contractors to shield themselves from liability).
In the meantime, undocumented workers living here for an extended period of time bring their wives/husbands over, or get married here, and raise families. Within a family you might have some children who are also undocumented (arriving with their parents), or they may be citizens (born here in the U.S. after arrival. Many, if not most of these families, are hard-working people who have established lives here, are valuable assets to their communities, and go out of their way to avoid trouble with the authorities. They do have some limitations in their lives – most cannot get a mortgage where they could own their own home, visits to their homeland are risky (they might not be able to return), and their children face severe limitations on their ability to go to college.
So here we see the complexity of the immigration issue. It’s not a choice between all or nothing, “unlimited” (which NOBODY is prosposing), versus “seal the borders” (also, which few are proposing). In between is a rational balance of immigration levels which take into account the need for workers in certain fields, allows hard-working, law-abiding people to legally immigrate to this country, and provides a path to citizenship for them and their children.
There was an example coming out of Indiana a few months ago. A 17-year old student was a good student, worked hard in his father’s construction business, helped out at his church and gave time and money to charity. He recieved multiple offers from colleges, including several offers of band scholarships. But when he submitted the final paperwork, the school informed him that there was trouble with his social security number – it didn’t exist. It turned out that he was born in Mexico six months before his parents immigrated to the U.S., rather than being born in the U.S. as his parents had told him. His college scholarships were withdrawn, he can’t even get admitted to college, and he and his parents are facing deportatin to a country he’s never known. His three younger brothers and sisters, however, can stay in the U.S. – they were born here.
Kind of a hard web to unravell at this point with simplistic slogans about cutting off illegal immigration, and “no amnesty” pledges.
Of course, Rush Limbaugh thinks that there’s no such thing as a complicated issue. He says that if a law can’t be reduced to three pages, he won’t read it.
Somehow that doesn’t surprise me very much.
“If you wait to get in legally, then you will be waiting for most of your lifetime.”
There seems to be quite a few South or Central American Indians picking sala in western Washington forests for sale to wholesale florists. Any idea how that came about? It seems they’ve been here for years. I can hardly go out the door without running into them. I’ve wondered if they were all refugees from El Salvador or something. They work very hard at what they do.
It IS a complicated issue. The Republican (businesses) use the cheap labor gladly. The Democrats are happy to get as many votes as they can…but SO are the Republicans. George W. Bush made a HUGE push to get Hispanic votes, was constantly trying out his Spanish speaking skills and DID get nearly 40% of the Hispanic vote.
Look, the reason the Democrats get more votes from minority communities is because of how the Republicans in the last 30-40 years treated the minorities (segregation and marriage laws to keep blacks from marrying whites…anti-gay laws…using Hispanics as scapegoats). I mean with a track record like that why WOULD any minority vote Republican? Even IF I agreed with the childish Republican philosophy (give me stuff but I won’t pay for it) I still wouldn’t vote for them. I won’t listen to a party make speeches about how the Constitution needs to be changed to “protect” the nation from me and my “lifestyle”, and how I shouldn’t be able to marry, adopt children, or whatnot because I’m so EVIL…and then ask for my VOTE. Seriously? I can’t imagine why more gay people don’t vote Republican. Just can’t figure it out…hmmm. When you spit in someones face and then ask for their vote, it’s a little tricky.
@2 “Yeah, i forgot, we are supposed to roll over and give them all amnesty.”
Why not? Republicans give amnesty to torturers and killers.
@7 “Rush Limbaugh … says that if a law can’t be reduced to three pages, he won’t read it.”
I kinda like his idea. You can’t squeeze very many corporate tax exemptions into three pages.
@ 10
Why not? Republicans give amnesty to torturers and killers.
And terrorists.
The Bush family has a long history of supporting terrorism and “covert operations” against foreign and domestic governing bodies.
They are the new fascism personified.
@13….I hate to break it to you pal, but covert operations and “terorism” against foreign governing bodies was going on strong long before either Bush got into the white house….
Start with Truman, and it goes all the way to Obama and current day.
@ 14
Aaaannd who was the US Senator that pushed the funding for the creation of the CIA under Truman?
Oh, thats right , good old Prescott Bush, largely credited with creating and setting the original doctrine of the CIA. Nazi SS General Heinrich Muller being one of the primary founders of the covert operations sector of the CIA, who had a direct line to Truman and was one of Prescott Bush’s primary governmental contacts in Germany during WW2.
and? so?
the CIA was simply a replacement for the OSS…
No different than KGB or MI5 or any other similar agency. Many nations have a counterpart…so again I ask: so?
I suppose next you will tell that it was Omar Al-bin Bush who flew a plane into the WTC…
and I must correct my previous post..it was Roosevelt who approved the original idea..not Truman….Truman just finished off what Roosevelt started.
That damn evil progressive Roosevelt…LOL
Life Sentence Is Debated for Meat Plant Ex-Chief:
About damn time…
No jobs, no illegals!
Serious jail time for employers! As this case amply demonstrates, fines are just a cost of doing business for these cretins.
@17….I agree…lock the SOB up.
Sholom has friends!
http://www.facebook.com/pages/.....2353846323
“Friends of Sholom Rubashkin Did you know: Following Agriprocessors’ collapse, Postville, Iowa, became a ghost town. The population shrunk by nearly half; the town is nearly insolvent. The mayor resigned, reportedly out of frustration. The median household income dropped, unemployment rose, many are unable to sell their homes. The local church wor…ks around the clock to help the community’s largely unemployed immigrants pay for food and rent.”
Huh?
.
Meanwhile …
Rally and riot on Saturday, as we did in Chicago. Tell the Republican Nazis of Arizona to stop the hate.
No stinking “papers” required. Flags from the Fatherland optional.
you guys don’t have a good memory. In the early 80’s the govt promised a fix; Simpson and others pushed a bill w/ amnesty plus enforcement. Of course we never enforced, and now LIbtards want to give amnesty.
All this does is allowed permanent unlimited mexican immigration. I don’t care what you call it, it always ends up if they can sneak in, they can stay.
@20…how about just get the fuck out of the country and head back to Juarez? get in line to come into the country legally, just like the Asians and Europeans have to do.
and take the mexican flag and shove it up your ass while your at it too…
happy thoughts…
And some happy Daddy-Love thoughts to you, sir.
Was hoping everyone would appreciate the fine irony of being told by el Presidente Felipe Calderón that he has a right to export his poverty to the United States. He will send his tired, poor, wretched refuse here and we Norteamericanos will enjoy it. Or else.
El Presidente Barack Pedro Obama in La Casa Blanca agrees.
Here’s the irony part: While Calderon and Obama, dos amigos, demand that we tenderely treasure the undocumented guests from our southern border, Calderon tortures, rapes, and murders the immigrants who jump Mexico’s border from the south.
Reconquista only works one way and one place: here. Happy May Day, campanero comrades.
@21: Simpson-Mazzoli. Was supposed to settle everything. A one-shot amnesty because we’re tolerant, compassionate, and liberal. Followed by finally getting serious about the enforcement of our laws by using the force of federal law.
Let the two million claim jumpers of 1986 stay without being inconvenienced. Let them vote (legally for a change) for Democrats, and then force employers to finally do the right thing and do the I-9 two-step.
Problem solved. That’s why we conservatives have to understand how dumb we are. A problem as big as illegal immigration in 1986 could never have been solved without Regulation and Big Big Government. When will we conservatives ever learn that we just need to give in and let Big Government regulate everything else for our own good?
Caught a little of the big guy’s act this morning. Had been thinking, around 0900, that the Gulf spill is way too convenient.
And way too similar to the ELF MO: torched subdivisions, torched Urban Horticulture buildings, torched SUV sales lots.
At about 1030 Rush was hinting at something similar. Is the BP blowout perhaps an Earth Day prank to stifle Obama’s noises about off-shore exploration?
Keep in mind that I’m not an Art Bell nut. Oswald killed Kennedy. 9/11 was an outside job by Osama and KSM, not Bush. Obama’s a citizen, probably of the US, not Kenya.
But ELF is ELF. Leftist fanatics are leftist fanatics. Connect the dots.
¡Hola Wingfucks!
About damn time we learn to trust our government. Elections have consequences, as GBS BSs over and over, and we’ve just got to veg back, roll over, salute, and accept the consequences of letting Democrats run our lives.
It’s what being patriotic is all about.
Well, voters didn’t receive Panther ministrations too well two years ago, but intimidation was a small price to pay for letting Senator Obama have his way.
href=”http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1179231/black_panthers_intimidate_voters_in.html” rel=”nofollow”>>”Black Panthers” Intimidate Voters in Philadelphia
As for AZTLAN, MS-13 has that right on schedule.
We on the right respect their activism. That’s what America’s all about.
You know, it must really be tough for progressives:
one one hand you have illegals destroying good union jobs by undercutting the wage market.
on the other hand, they just cant resist getting their hands on that voting bloc.
whats a democrat to do?
@28 Do you remember when the landscape contractor would should up at the end of an MS project? Too funny. You knew when the project was nearly done when the brown hoard showed up. I wondered at the time how many were legal. Those dudes are labor intensive! On one project, maybe Redwest or Pebble Beach, I joined an audience of construction workers watching maybe fifteen workers manhandle a big tree down a severe slope near a building. Any other contractor would have brought in heavy equipment.
@28 “illegals destroying good union jobs”
But is that really true? Which union jobs are being destoyed? Well, heh, other than maybe landscape contracting jobs. Do they even have a union? Anyway, that’s probably little better than fast food work and it’s somewhat seasonal. I mean, it’s a great right-wing talking point and all, but I don’t really see it, Max, not that I see everything that goes on. And I certainly have no handle on who all is unionized in this country. Lot’s less folk than there used to be. I do know that much.
Goldy’s in bed with domestic terrorists again, getting fleas. Wonder how many oppressed SEIU peóns got kneecapped to extort goldy’s two-point-five?
Wonder how many fat-cat SEIU goons goldy had to bop before they dropped their wad?
The patriots wave the red, white and blue.
I was a patriot. I enlisted and went to Vietnam. Kiss my PTSD’d Nam vet’s ass.
The really troubling part about Simpson-Mazzoli is that Simpson was my homeboy and (ahem) a Republican. Rather like Ronald Reagan who signed on and signed it.
Sorry about the dinked link for Philadelphia voter intimidation in 2008 by New Black Panthers. Those of us who remember the old Black Panthers were amused that terrorists threatening voters didn’t get more buzz. The media must have doing some reverse profiling, but they were also ahead of the curve. DOJ says the NBP did nothing wrong.
@29…LOL @ “bronw hoard”….
so true Steve, so true.
those 15 guys working for 6 hours still cost less than a rented Cat for 2…..besides, water from a hose is free, diesel isnt.
@29….on a side note, have you noticed that (it seems like) all the tile and granite countertop guys are Russian or eastern european…
people finding their nitch I guess….
The bushcheneypowellrovericerumsfeld gang.
Where’s RICO when we need it?
Thought the Russians and Eastern Euros did their niche marketing by cornering the carjack market.
@30…Steve I think you do see it in many trades. non-union guys hiring questionable labor do indeed undercut union contractors while bidding the same projects.
It does not effect the public work, but it is killing many union trades in the private market.
framers, roofers, concrete, hell, even structural steel too! I was involved in a 5 story condo project on the east side a few years ago..the concrete and steel contractors were from Arizona and New Mexico….NOBODY spoke english..so they couldnt communicate with the guy running the tower crane…talk about a clusterfuck. it sucked for us, bucase this was a THICK structural concrete slab, so here we are, placing 500 sleeves per floor after the bar goes down, and these are running crazy with the crane nearly killing everybody.
as a side note: they did such a shitty job on the elevator shaft(out of plumb and crooked like a mofo), that the elevator contractor(Kone I think) got a HUGE change order to fabricate extra steel and rails just get the elevator to work.
those were the days…….
@37….lol….I think they even have union for that.
Correction: We wave the Ted, white, and blue.
@36…didnt you hear? Rico Suave came out of the closet. He is currently running a Nude Hot Yoga class for men near Alki…
Several years ago, recent Russian immigrants were racking up carjacks in the semi-high double digits.
Just doing the crime jobs that born-here Americans won’t do, I guess. That’s why immigration is a win-win for our economy.
Steve @ 30, Carpenters, construction labors, roofers, cement finishers, iron workers, and many other construction jobs that use to be well paying union jobs but are not now with the cheap labor of illegal’s being hired by cheap labor conservatives and cheap ass liberals. Union labors have a hard time finding jobs except for government jobs that require prevailing wages, which mean union.
I can remember in the early 1980’s that timber companies like Weyerhaeuser, Rayonier, and Simpson would pay tree planters $8 per hour. That would be around $18 today to plant their trees in the fall and winter. Many people in coastal counties like Grays Harbor, Mason, and Pacific supplemented their income doing this work. But when the timber companies found out they could get illegal’s for far less, that was it for American tree planters.
The big lie that illegal’s do work that American’s wouldn’t is that, a big lie!
Is that the Nude Hot Yoga class where YLB hangs out instead of going to work?
@44..nah, he is a member of the Cleveland Steamers Union Local 110, Capitol Hill chapter…
@43..”The big lie that illegal’s do work that American’s wouldn’t is that, a big lie!”
very true..
Gotta go and put the finishing touches on our Uno de Mayo diversity celebration.
Waiting for Rabbit’s RSVP to my dinner invitation (fava beans and a nice chianti). You’re welcome to join us, rubbish.
Um, Cleveland Steamers Rochester Rusty Trombones? OKC Blumpkins Detroit Donkey Punches? SD Dirty Sanchezes?
Thanks for the thoughtful replies.
To ramble on, in my profession there’s more Russian female immigrants employed than there are all racial minorities combined. Well, if you don’t count Filipinos. For reasons that I think date back to WWII and the older Pacific war vets who were principals of many firms, they’ve had a place since the 70’s. But I think the real reason there was a hiring binge of Filipino engineers back then, most all immigrants, was that there weren’t many other minorities interested or qualified when we had quotas and such. Those were the days when a male professional would start a company, make his wife the owner, and then go after minority contracts.