Bush Pressing Hard (To Sell Americans Out) on Immigration Bill
 

NewsMax.com Wires
Saturday, June 2, 2007

WASHINGTON -- President Bush challenged lawmakers on Friday to have the political courage to pass an immigration bill amid intense pressure from critics who call it amnesty and advocates who believe the current system is broken.

Bush stressed that while voting for the bill might be politically risky, he does not think the measure itself is risky.

"This is a difficult issue for a lot of folks," the president said. "I understand that. But because it's difficult probably means we need to work doubly hard to get it done. And now's the time to get it done.

"No matter how difficult it may seem for some politically, I strongly believe it's in this nation's interest for people here in Washington to show courage and resolve and pass a comprehensive immigration reform."

Bush was working to bolster support for a bipartisan measure - one of his top domestic priorities - that lawmakers will address when they return from recess early next week. A bill being discussed would legalize millions of illegal immigrants, tighten border security and mandate that employers verify they are hiring legal workers.

The bill includes conservative-backed initiatives such as the worker verification program to prevent illegal immigrants from getting jobs, and a new point system to prioritize skills and education over family in deciding who can immigrate in the future.

Liberals decry the point scheme as unfair to families and are vehemently opposed to a guest worker program that would allow laborers to come to the U.S. for temporary stints without a guarantee they would be able to stay and eventually gain citizenship.

But it also includes a long-sought liberal priority: granting legal status to the nation's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants. Conservatives view that as an unacceptable amnesty program.

"This bill isn't amnesty," Bush said. "For those who call it amnesty, they're just trying to, in my judgment, frighten people about the bill. This bill is one that says we recognize that you're here illegally and there's a consequence for it. We can argue about the consequences, but you can't argue about the fact that there are consequences in this bill for people who have broken our law."

Once again, He knows what's best for us even if we don't want them here. I thought politicians were supposed to voice our concerns and do what we want them to do, not act as our parents did when we were children. Bush is a Democrat.

That's not true. Just taking the handful of people on this board, there is no consensus. The politicians don't know what you want unless you tell them. I'm not claiming they care, just won't know.

I do, however, object to the illegals having a voice in the process.

*milk shoots out nose*

He wants them here for their cheap labor which is not a democratic view.

Dude, that's only supposed to happen when you're drinking milk...

[/SouthPark]

The local paper called the immigration vote a "stinging rebuke" to Bush. I find it difficult to agree, though. I don't think any kind of lawmaking or legislation effective within the jurisdiction of the United States about Mexican illegals will have any palpable effect. This would only have amounted to a futile, albeit showy and noisy, tinkering at the margins -- an ineffectual treatment of the symptom of the real problem, which lies south of the Rio Grande, and the failure to achieve something ineffectual that doesn't strike at the root of the problem isn't going to sting for very long nor very deeply.

The real problem is that Mexico doesn't have a middle class to speak of, which problem stretches back all the way to the manner in which the Spanish colonized the place and has its origin therein.

Rather than the flood of numerous smallholders that came to North America and did good by doing well each in his own vineyard and fig tree, as it were, Mexico was sparsely colonized by Spanish aristocrats who set up a replication of the latifundial economy of medieval Spain. A major strategic mistake, socioeconomically speaking, though it is hard to imagine them doing anything but replicating that which they knew.

A horde of smallholders makes a middle class, and security of property rights makes a prosperous middle class. Property rights should be something pretty well sacred, and not dispensed with lightly, and perhaps not at all. Mexico's never been that solid about secure property rights -- the government can still confiscate, and too easily. A small cadre of aristocrats pursuing the traditional aristocrats' economy and its interest -- well, if this isn't the wellspring of every socioeconomic problem and the virulent symptoms that erupt like the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua, then it sure is the source of the Panther's share -- "the Owl, as a boon/Was kindly permitted to pocket the spoon."

Lacking a middle class's opportunities in their native countries, insinuating themselves into a society that actually has a middle class visible without magnification actually becomes a practicable solution for these huddling masses, and since Mexico's second-greatest source of foreign exchange is monetary remittances from inside the United States, it's a successful one too. The story is not too dissimilar elsewhere in Latin America, for the same problems are present, from the same origins.

Another problem is that there aren't enough jobs in Mexico.

That is NOT our problem, nor is it one that we should be required to fix. We should accept that it is our problem that we have so many millions of people here to entered illegally, how to close the borders so that any future fix will be effective. There can be no solution to fix the immigration policy-problem until an effective means of controlling and closing the border is addressed, IMHO. The immigration bill by Bush was feel good measure and did not fix the problems. The misc amendments added at the end did not help the situation. In the long run it would have cost us more money. We must fix the border problem first.

Guess they need to get to work on reforming their country then, not taking our over.

Funny. That is not what happened in the Doha round of GATT? The entire world walked out three days early in Cancun because nations who put massive funding into corporate welfare refused to negotiate free trade.

Those companies so desperate for migrant workers (foolishly called illegal immigrants) find it cheaper to stay in America and employee foreigners. Smarter (and necessary for the long term stability of American borders) is to have companies whose workers would only be migrants to move those industries to where the workers are.

But when one's head is stuck in the sand, then one declares with open defiance. It’s called a world market. If it is not our problem, then why do we get so concerned when the Mexican or Argentinean peso drops - when markets in other countries become unstable. Clearly we should have done nothing to help Mexico during its liquidity crisis. It's not our problem. Screw them? It only says much about the self centered attitude of the poster; not the realities of this world.

My position is that we may have great interest in what goes on around us, in world markets, in other countries, but that does not make it our problem to fix. Much of the mess we are in today is due to such thinking. The issue is how do we regulate the current immigration mess, stem the tide of people blatently flaunting our legal system, sucking our border states social systems dry, all the while supporting the needs of our businesses and labor pool needs.

If you consider the matter more carefully, you will see that this is not another problem, but a symptom of the want of a middle class. This is one of the ways the overarching problem manifests itself: another way to put it is "too few employers."

The whole NAFTA highway thing is really pissing-me-off. I hope it gets over ridden by a sane president next term.

I agree, it was totally the wrong thing to do. Future generations will not survive unless our children's children learn spanish fluently. And what do you think about these radical Mexicans who are making an effort to change our society through a planned organized process of illegal immigration. I heard one of their spokes persons on a news program last month and his ideas were inflamatory.

Sauce for the goose just might sauce the gander pretty well, though -- how about enough Anglos going south to become a political bloc of middleclass smallholders and get Mexico doing what we do so well through sheer influx and demographic change?

Radical and not immediately attractive, but...

Pass. Few places in Mexico are all that attractive. Desert, heat, bad water, poor sanitation, poor economy. No thanks.

I'd say the sad state of Mexico is actually our problem, but only because they're making it ours. Even if it's a pain in our side, it's not our responsibility to fix anymore then it is our responsibility to police any other nation. Every group of people must work for themselves, if it's wrong to overthrow the Iraqi government then why should we be expected to forcefully reorganize Mexico's government?

I think it would be a great idea and perfectly reasonable, at this point, to start to take-over Mexico.
Good for the Goose, exactly.

Sounds like the Free State project here in the US that Radar originally championed.

Hmm... Radar seems to be taking a bit of a vacation from posting here since his leaving the LP. Perhaps a link?

Radar left the LP?

He said so. I believe it was at the tail end of his campaign thread.

On *this* forum?

Radar championing the FSP

I looked in his concession thread, but didn't see him mention leaving the LP. Of course, I didn't look that hard.

Ah right, he's busy securing his land in New Hampshire.

I bet he's busy being a Dad. He wasn't initially keen on New Hampshire as the chosen state. I like it but I've already built my compou.. ah homestead.

Oh but it can't be!!

If this hardest of hard-ass freedom fighters actually stayed in one of the least free states, and decided nothing short of raising his family there, that would mean his excitement at participation in the FSF, and his subsequent hard sell to everyone else, were just empty fantasy!

Like everything else he's done or thought politically.