IMMIGRATION: THE NEXT BIG FIGHT

POSTED BY: SignyM
UPDATED: Monday, June 3, 2024 14:49
VIEWED: 2296
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SIGNYM

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:02 PM

For the record, I'm against illegal immigration. I have nothing against legal immigration: I'm married to a legal immigrant and am a child of a legal immigrant. However, my hubby (the immigrant) thinks that immigration should not be criminalized.
AGAINST IMMIGRATION

Quote:
Santa Barbara, Calif. – Walking the sandy beachfront in this ultra-affluent city, I chanced upon two Hispanic men rummaging through the trash. Startled at the sight, I stared momentarily. One of them yelled at me, “You look now, but in 50 years we will own all this!” Given the tsunami of illegal immigration and the prolific Hispanic birthrate, I responded, “I believe you will.”

US Census statistics suggest the scavenging man was right. California, now about 37 percent Latino, is expected to be majority Hispanic by 2042. A quarter of all Americans will probably be Latino in 40 years. This trend has worrisome aspects. Imagine a huge, growing Hispanic underclass in America with a grudge, a burning sense of having been victimized by the “gringos.” I witnessed this grudge up close a few years ago at Texas A&M International University in Laredo. Hispanic students challenged me, claiming any restriction of illegal immigration across the US southern border with Mexico is a violation of Latinos’ human rights.

Me: “Would you try to reenter Spain without a passport?

Students: “Of course not.”

Me: “What about France, or Britain?”

Students: “No.”

Yet many of these illegal Latino immigrants suffer the illusion they are divinely entitled to colonize the US and not just the states bordering Mexico, but Chicago and the East Coast as well. Some Hispanics talk openly of a reconquista, an effort to reclaim the American Southwest that once belonged to Mexico. Historically, this concept is wide of the mark. Most Hispanic ancestors of immigrants owned no land. Their forebears were serfs of the Roman Catholic Church, once the largest landholder in Latin America and the world. Other ancestors labored as landless peons for Spanish colonial landlords who were later relieved of their lands by 19th-century Anglo-Americans.

Historical entitlement is but one of the myths surrounding illegal Hispanic immigration. Gringos have their own fables, such as ultimate assimilation into a greater English-speaking society.

Professor Lawrence Harrison of Tufts University in Medford, Mass., notes that “In California, fourth- and fifth-generation Mexican immigrants are still speaking only Spanish and resisting assimilation.” He says there are serious cultural barriers to the old melting-pot concept. “Words like compromise and dissent, crucial concepts to American democracy, have radically different meanings in Spanish.” Dissent, for example, translates into “heresy.”

Most alarming, today’s influx of poor Latin American immigrants comes from countries less than congenial to democracy, a law-based society, or public education. Many experts look with alarm on the fact that, unlike earlier European and Asian immigrants, the tsunami from the south too often undervalues educating children because many Hispanic parents resent the idea that their children will have more education than they have. In 2000, only 25 percent of working-age male Mexican immigrants had graduated high school, a sad fact that contributes to an increasingly volatile underclass.

Limited legal Latino immigration greatly enriches the United States. I’ve personally seen how Hispanic Americans bring tremendous loyalty and leadership qualities to our armed forces

But it is morally shameful to expect taxpayers to fund free education and medical care for lawbreakers so that the wealthiest Americans – restaurant owners, ranchers, agribusiness owners, and construction companies – can hire cheap labor regardless of the national consequences.

It is ever the wealthy sticking it to the poor. With so many Americans losing their homes and unable to find jobs, it is outrageous to say Hispanics still take jobs no one else will do.Congress, which generally represents the wealthy, should begin by imposing h

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MINCINGBEAST

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:19 PM

im always looking for the next big fight.

i would like to state, for the record, that my ancestors stole this land fair and square from the mexicans, and that we are not giving it back to them. ever!

but seriously, i'm conflicted on the topic. i don't think there's anything wrong with a state establishing, and maintaining, its borders. i do not think it is unreasonable to criminalize immigration that does not comply with the state's requirements. sort of a fundamental element of sovereignty, right?

i do, however, think that it is ridiculous to participate in an economic system (NAFTA!) that makes it necesary for people to immigrate, provides them no real legal avenue, and then exploits the shit out of them. We're happy to have their third-world-poverty-labor when it comes to picking our lettuce to keep wages down, but then we damn them for being here so we can exploit them.

my solution, no stupid biometic cards: import more decent, hard-working people (legal or not), and export t-baggers and jethros in return.

RUE

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:23 PM

Or --- you could tank the economy and slow the flood of illegal immigrants to a trickle !

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Silence is consent.

CHRISISALL

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:24 PM

Gattica.

The laughing Chrisisall

"I only do it to to remind you that I'm right and that deep down, you know I'm right, you want me to be right, you need me to be right." - The Imperial Hero Strikes Back, 2010

RUE

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:26 PM

"... the tsunami from the south too often undervalues educating children because many Hispanic parents resent the idea that their children will have more education than they have."

This is something I have heard and observed.

Previous European immigrants valued education - I may have to scrub toilets but my CHILDREN will go to college.

OTOH Mexican, and Central and S Americans see children aspiring to more as an affront - what, I'm not good enough for you ?

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Silence is consent.

SIGNYM

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:30 PM

Just going to toss in: Controlling immigration might be one of those things that "big government" can do that no other entity can.

RUE

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:31 PM

Now that I think about it ... the Social Security Administration already knows if there are several people on the same ID. It shouldn't take a genius to track down the employers who have failed to vet the numbers and fine them BIG TIME.

So, why not ?

What I see is that this is a way to keep corporations off the hook while putting the onus on the average citizen to somehow prove they are legal.

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Silence is consent.

CHRISISALL

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 10:45 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Just going to toss in: Controlling immigration might be one of those things that "big government" can do that no other entity can.

Finally! A REASON!!!

SUCCESS!!!!

The laughing Chrisisall

"I only do it to to remind you that I'm right and that deep down, you know I'm right, you want me to be right, you need me to be right." - The Imperial Hero Strikes Back, 2010

GEEZER

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 11:17 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
Now that I think about it ... the Social Security Administration already knows if there are several people on the same ID. It shouldn't take a genius to track down the employers who have failed to vet the numbers and fine them BIG TIME.

So, why not ?

A lot of it is privacy concerns. The Congress is very leery of giving anyone, even other Federal agencies, access to either SSA or IRS information keyed to Social Security numbers. Even IRS programmers who need large amounts of liove data to stress test tax processing programs have to develop sanitized data without real peoples' names and SSNs.

It is, by the way, illegal to hire illegal aliens. It's just very hard to research and enforce and prosecutions have been going down for the past ten years or so.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

RUE

Tuesday, March 30, 2010 11:40 PM

I'm not saying give private info to private parties or even enforcement.

I'm saying that the SSA should give out EMPLOYER info to enforcement if EMPLOYERS are hiring illegal aliens. After all, EMPLOYERS can access the SSA database to see if the SS numbers are valid. If there are multiple people contributing to the SSA under one number then SOMEBODY has hired them without checking - or without caring that the number is invalid. Find out who. Go after them.

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Silence is consent.

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