Arizona Immigration Law Reveals Republican Split On Immigration
The Arizona immigration law is once again bringing to light an underlying tension on the entire immigration issue among Republicans:
LOS ANGELES — Republican lawmakers and candidates are increasingly divided over illegal immigration — torn between the need to attract Latino support, especially at the ballot box, and rallying party members who support tougher action.
Arizona’s new measure, which requires that the police check the documents of anyone they stop or detain whom they suspect of being in the country illegally, has forced politicians far and wide to take a stance. But unlike in Washington, where a consensus exists among establishment Republicans, the fault lines in the states — where the issue is even more visceral and immediate — are not predictable.
Conservative Republican governors like Jim Gibbons of Nevada, Robert F. McDonnell of Virginia and Rick Perry of Texas have criticized the Arizona law. But some more moderate Republicans, like Tom Campbell, who is running in the party’s Senate primary in California, have supported it.
(…)
In states with hotly contested elections, several Republican candidates are finding their positions mobile, reflecting the delicacy of the issue and a growing body of polls that suggest many voters support the Arizona law.
In Florida, for instance, Attorney General Bill McCollum, who is running for governor, now says he approves of the law, though he called it “far out” two weeks ago; Marco Rubio, the state’s Republican Senate nominee, has also shifted his stance.
State Republicans now find themselves in a balancing act, trying to seize a moment of Congressional stalemate to demonstrate leadership while not repelling voters on either side of the debate, a challenge that is particularly daunting for those in a primary fight.
“I think we need to be very careful about immigration,” said Karl Rove, the former adviser to President George W. Bush. “I applaud Arizona for taking action, but I think the rhetoric on all sides ought to be lowered.”
Mr. Rove and other strategists who worked for Mr. Bush were proponents of an immigration overhaul that included a path to legal status.
That bill, widely derided as “amnesty” by movement conservatives and talk-radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity despite the fact that it wasn’t all that different from the immigration bill signed into law by President Reagan twenty years earlier. It was also the last serious effort on a national level to deal with immigration legislatively, rather than treating it as the political wedge issue that it is today.
The problems that Republican face on this issue are two-fold.
In states with significant Hispanic populations like Florida, Texas, and California, taking a hard line stand against immigration poses the risk that the GOP will lose support in a fast-growing part of the population. That’s why, for example, you’re unlikely to see anything like the Arizona law being proposed by a California Republican, and why even the conservative Governor of Texas has said that the law is “not right” for his state.
Additionally, the GOP’s ties to the business community, especially small businesses, are likely to make it difficult for the party to fully support enforcement and employment verification measures that increase costs for business. E-verify type programs are not a significant problem for large businesses to implement, for example, but the administrative burden of such programs on small businesses, which is one explanation for the extent to which the Chamber of Commerce departs from orthodox conservativism on the issue of immigration.
In a rational political environment, this issue would be dealt with the way every contentious issue is dealt with, through compromise; perhaps something along these lines. This is hardly a rational environment, however, and any attempt at compromise is likely to be instantly denounced by both extremes. Unless it finds a solution to it’s divide, however, the GOP is likely to find itself left behind.
It’s not surprising that immigration reveals a fault line in the Republican coalition. Libertarians and social conservatives are frequently at daggers drawn on this subject.
However, Democrats are divided on this issue, too. The views of progressives and the socially conservative base on which the party actually depends are not completely in harmony.
That having been said the issue seems to present more of a problem for the Republicans than for the Democrats. If the GOP is to be anything other than the party of white Southern social conservatives, it will need to come to terms with the issue.
I don’t think that this:
is much of an issue. Does supporting something at some point in history, determining that approach failed, and supporting something else twenty years later constitute hypocrisy? Is there some time limit on historic policy positions?
Just for the record I’m a Democrat, believe in a substantial increase in the number of work visas available to Mexican nationals, have no particular feeling one way or another on the “path to citizenship” issue, and believe in strengthened workplace and border enforcement.
Is “amnesty” actually a fair characterization at this point? Not from what I’ve seen.
It seems more a litmus test, if any Mexican resident in the US has a path to citizenship, someone on the right can call it “amnesty” and go off.
I support work visas, and that if any Mexican national wants citizenship they have to apply at a US Embassy in Mexico. Since that allows illegals to go south and apply, it could be called “amnesty” by the crazed branch of the GOP.
BTW, I didn’t say applications should all be granted. The question of which applications, world-wide, should be granted seems off-limit in mainstream discussion.
Perhaps that’s because Mexican nationals do feel a right of acceptance, something Americans may not be willing to grant them.
Um, that bill was an amnesty bill as your link clearly indicates, and we were told then that it would never happen again. Hope and change! Not so much.
“Um, that bill was an amnesty bill as your link clearly indicates”
Which link, and by which definition of amnesty?
There is no group more stupid in politics that the open border, cheap labor Republicans. Reagan lied when the last amnesty (promised to be the final amnesty) and now California has been lost to the Republicans forever and the number of whites in California is lower today than it was in 1990.
Why do the cheap labor Republicans want to turn the U.S. into a high tax, low productivity third world nation where the few white left will pack themselves into a few places like Vermont in order to survive.
If anyone is a conservative and believes in smaller government, lower taxes, good local schools, and giving people the ability to achieve, then one does not support open borders and unlimited government.
However, if one supports making the U.S. a third-world county where a few elites act as Patrons over a massive number of peons, then go ahead and support open borders and unlimited immigration (also know as amnesty forever).
The cheap labor Republicans lied last time when they talked about amnesty and they are lying now. If one wants a third world county with high taxes, then one should move to the Democratic Party where that is the goal for the U.S.
Because, contrary to what so many of them will try to tell you, it is not illegal immigration that many Republicans oppose, but immigration in and of itself.
Yowza.
… I think I’ll go make a burrito.
A majority of US citizens are against illegal immigration which, BTW, is also against on-the-books laws of the US Government. Particularly with the imminent threat from terrorists of many backgrounds, it is imperative that all immigrants to this country pass through legal channels so that we KNOW WHO THEY ARE. Mexico is a disproportionate contributor to illegal immigrants here, and it is ludicrous — the height of arrogance — for the Presidente of Mexico to lambaste us for wanting to have some control over our borders. Why is there any debate at all over his irrational words? Why does the press continue to give editorial space to debates over racism, profiling, or any other PC red herring when in truth it has nothing to do with anything other than national security? Why should either party pander to a group of law-breakers who are a minority in hopes that someday they will become a majority? We need more than spicy headlines. Citizens are simply angry that our own government continues to NOT uphold and enforce our reasonable immigration laws.
Super:
Yep, them Mexicans is scary. Here in California we white people are barely surviving. I’m pretty sure the Chinese who live on either side of me feel the same way.
It’s pretty much a state of siege, all of us hunkered down with our guns loaded and our teeth chattering. The trips to Ralph’s, the mall, Costco, Target, CVS, the dry cleaner, the kid’s school, the bank, the doctor, Disneyland, the beach . . . not to mention Pollo Loco . . . are all very Mad Max.
Scary, scary “other.” Must flee to Vermont!
Wait. . . what’s that sound? Oh no! Oh my GOD! It’s a dude named Juan! Run! Ruuuuuuun!
Michael,
The Los Angeles Unified School District is 9% white. To be white and to live in Los Angeles means you have to be rich enough to afford private school for your children or not have children. Either life choice can be seen as “hunkering down.” The same goes for many other cities in California, you either have to be rich enough to avoid the underclass or live a lifestyle that limits the impact. Look at how fewer blacks there are in California versus 20 years ago. Whites have moved out because there is no future for them in California.
Why do the cheap-labor Republicans want to turn the entire country into Los Angeles (or El Paso, Brownsille, Santa Ana, Ontario California, Laredo,etc). If the cheap labor Republicans are so intent on living in a third world country, please move to Mexico for a few years and then come back and tell us that open borders and unlimited immigration is a great idea.
“Open borders and unlimited immigration is a” straw-man argument. No one actually proposes that.
I guess we’ve got people who want to block work visas and immigration at any level above zero per year. For them any number of visas greater than zero is “unlimited.”
That’s not really what the word means.
Super:
Black does not equal poor. Nor does Hispanic equal poor. You conflate these.
In southern California we have rich and poor, and we have all different ethnic groups. We have rich schools with substantial minority populations and we have poor schools that are mostly white. We have white schools that score badly and minority schools that score well.
Where I live in Irvine, I believe our schools are 40% Asian and are very good schools.
But in Fullerton the schools are much more black and Hispanic and are also good schools. Fullerton’s Sunny Hills High gets a GreatSchools rating of 10, its oldest high School, Fullerton Union gets an 8, and both have high proportions of minorities. I drive by Fullerton Union most days and don’t see all that many white kids.
So, somehow, despite the fact that incomes are higher in Irvine, and our population is white and Asian, the Fullerton high schools do just about as well with a somewhat less affluent population, and many more Hispanics and blacks.
And in neither area is anyone “hunkering down.”
Just a suggestion: look at the real world as it is, and not at your paranoid racist fantasies.
. . .wasn’t all that different from the immigration bill signed into law by President Reagan twenty years earlier.
So what? Find me any Republicans who applaud that Reagan initiative as being a successful example of legislation and a key determinant that brought Hispanics into the Republican fold.
Frankly, Reagan’s Amnesty is widely viewed as a failure on the part of the Gipper.
In states with significant Hispanic populations like Florida, Texas, and California, taking a hard line stand against immigration poses the risk that the GOP will lose support in a fast-growing part of the population. That’s why, for example, you’re unlikely to see anything like the Arizona law being proposed by a California Republican,
As to the first part of your paragraph, the GOP is in a bit of a quandry here in that they see that any Hispanic support for open borders is premised on the notion that allegiance should first be given to ethnic compatriots of a foreign land before being given to fellow citizens. Appealing to people who hold that mindset that they should join the Republican Party because the Republicans don’t pander to racial and ethnic blocs is going to be an almost impossible sell.
Any Hispanic citizen who shows allegiance to country before allegiance to foreign invaders in our midst is likely going to find the efforts of Republicans to defend national sovereignty an appealing position and so is already either on board with Republicans or predisposed to making that move as the anti-sovereignty and race/ethnicity hustling forces scream ever louder.
Why should Republicans abandon their positions on enforcement of laws, preservation of national sovereignty and adherence to policies which don’t engage in racial and ethnic spoils systems in order to appeal to a constituency which seems to like these factors and is already under the fold of a party which stands against the positions that the Republicans defend? How on Earth could the Republicans come out for the better by becoming like Democrats?
Additionally, the GOP’s ties to the business community, especially small businesses, are likely to make it difficult for the party to fully support enforcement and employment verification measures that increase costs for business.
Sure, there are always constituencies that want to bend governance so that they can benefit from a privatization of gains and socialization of losses, but if the Republicans stand fast with the larger community who don’t benefit from this corruption, then where are these exploiters going to go, the Democrats?
Unless it finds a solution to it’s divide, however, the GOP is likely to find itself left behind.
Not likely. It’s a matter of weighing the costs/benefits that arise from policy alternatives and the compromise solution will result in dilution of brand appeal across wide swaths of America, whereas an approach that deports aliens will result in wide spread appreciation for Republicans defending national sovereignty, rule of law, and for helping the lower classes while the Democrats wanted to screw them over. The negative aspect to a no-compromise position will be a disgruntled faction within the party and they will get used to the “draconian” measure of actually having to verify the immigration status of each employee. Oh the burdens these people will have to bear.
Since that allows illegals to go south and apply, it could be called “amnesty” by the crazed branch of the GOP.
You left out the important catch. They have to go to the back of the line. That condition is always excluded. So what you’re describing is a charade. Mexican illegal crosses the border, fills out a form and then 2 hours later comes back across the border into the US and is now legal. BFD. That’s Ammesty Kabuki Theater.
superdestroyer: Why do the cheap labor Republicans want to turn the U.S. into a high tax, low productivity third world nation where the few white left will pack themselves into a few places like Vermont in order to survive.
John Personna: Yowza
I’m not exactly sure what part here warranted the Yowza comment, but this analysis from the Chief Demographer of Texas might shed some light on some of the suppositions underlying superdestroyer’s argument:
Mike,
You lose the argument when you point out a school that is 21% Hispanic as being an example of a good public school.
Please find the best public high school that is 50% or more Hispanic. I would love to research that majority Hispanic High School filled with rich or upper class Hispanic. I have lived in San Antonio and El Paso. Such a school did not exist in two cities where over 80% of the population is Hispanic.
Maybe you could point to all the research on the performance of white student in majority black or Hispanic schools. Try to look it up and you fill find a single report done over 20 years ago that scared the professional educators so much that they refuse to research the topic.
Go ahead and keep trying to convince yourself that cheaper restaurant meals and dry wall installation is worthy the massively high taxes that you and every other middle class white guy will end up paying so fund the open borders and unlimited immigration programs.
And yes, amnesty is exactly the same as open borders and unlimited immigration: get into the U.S. and one gets to stay and qualifies for government handouts.
Super:
San Antonio? Okay. Clark High School. It gets a GreatSchools rank of 9 out of 10. Comments from parents and students give it 4 out of 5 stars.
It is 43% white, 43% Hispanic and 8% black. So, majority non-white.
In grade 9 reading scores at Clark, 98% of whites achieved grade proficiency vs. 94% for Hispanics.
In grade 10 it was 98% and 95% respectively. Grade 11 it was 98% for whites, 99% for Hispanics.
And that’s in English/Language Arts, a subject in which many of the Hispanics come from homes where English is a second language.
Michael,
You should look at the long term data, the school is probably on the down slop of success since it used to be more white and less Hispanic. My guess is that it has reached critical mass and that whites have stopped buying homes in that area of San Antonio. See http://www.schooldigger.com/go/TX/schools/3312003722/school.aspx
You should also looked up the high school in South San Antonio. Virtually all Hispanic and poor performers.
San Antonio? Okay. Clark High School. It gets a GreatSchools rank of 9 out of 10. Comments from parents and students give it 4 out of 5 stars.
It is 43% white, 43% Hispanic and 8% black. So, majority non-white.
In grade 9 reading scores at Clark, 98% of whites achieved grade proficiency vs. 94% for Hispanics.
In grade 10 it was 98% and 95% respectively. Grade 11 it was 98% for whites, 99% for Hispanics.
And that’s in English/Language Arts, a subject in which many of the Hispanics come from homes where English is a second language.
Nothing makes my day like when a doctrinaire liberal sets out to argue against reality by using cooked up statistics.
A classic liberal response to disparity is to jig the metrics so as to minimize the disparity and then claim the the underlying problem has been solved.
When liberals see racial/ethnic disparity on proficiency tests they act to disguise the problem by lowering the benchmark for achieving “proficiency.” Let me walk Reynolds through an illustration. Ask 100 children in a class, 50 black and 50 white, to explain the significance of the equation E=mc^2. When 5 caucasian children and 1 black child explain it, we see that a.) the proficiency bar has been set too high because too few children are able to answer the question, and b.) that there is a 5x proficiency gap between white and black. No, that cannot stand. To remedy this institutional racism the liberals rejig the proficiency test by making it less difficult and so they ask the 100 children to simply write their names. Wouldn’t you know it, all 100 children passed the test and so they are all proficient. The school worked miracles and eliminated the Racial Achievement Gap.
This is exactly what has transpired in California and Texas:
This tactic yields some truly bizarre results:
” worthy the massively high taxes that you and every other middle class white guy will end up paying so fund the open borders and unlimited immigration programs.”
We do not fund open borders. It costs nothing to let illegals cross. If you read across the spectrum of economists, it is unclear if illegals are a net cost.
Steve
We do not fund open borders. It costs nothing to let illegals cross. If you read across the spectrum of economists, it is unclear if illegals are a net cost.
This is pathetic. It’s like relying on Michael Behe’s stature as a biochemist to claim that it us unclear whether biochemists accept evolutionary principles in their work. Relying on Card’s shenanigans doesn’t imply that the fundamentals of labor market economics are in doubt.
What’s next? Will economists also declare that it is not clear that high school drop-outs are net cost to society?
john personna, the link contained in the section I bolded, first paragraph.
I already knew this, but pointed it out for those who would just imagine I was making it up.
Because, contrary to what so many of them will try to tell you, it is not illegal immigration that many Republicans oppose, but immigration in and of itself.
1.) The debate is about illegal immigration. Viewpoints on legal immigration are completely immaterial to this debate.
2.) The time to test your claim that these critics are also opposed to legal immigration is when the question of legal immigration is at issue.
3.) Ad arguendum, so what if they are opposed to legal immigration? Tell us what you think would be an ideal population target for the US and population sizes for it’s major cities. Is Los Angeles too small and would it benefit by adding another 25 million people to it’s population? Is road traffic flowing too smoothly and should our freeways be used to their “most efficient” design capacity by doubling the number of cars on them? Are we not contending with an optimum amount of suburban sprawl and would America be better off if we doubled our suburban sprawl? Are our drinking water reservoirs not being used to capacity so it would be better to double the water district’s population limit so as to more efficiently use all of that excess drinking water that is going to waste?
Tell us, would 500 million people be enough or should we shoot for a billion? Is there even a limit to population capacity for the US?
Super:
In other words: f–k the facts, you hate Hispanics, and no amount of evidence will alter your position. You asked for an example, I gave you one, and it was right in your own back yard.
Got it.
Now go talk to Brimelow, you have fallen below the threshold to which I bother responding.
By definition those who cross our borders illegally are not illegal immigrants, they are invaders. We are being invaded by our southern neighbor. There are various political reasons for this, but when you let the left dictate the dialog about what to call these invaders you are open to all manner of things to demean a position against them. Both sets of my grandparents were immigrants. They went through the proper channels. They had sponsors and followed the law to become citizens. It is not racist to want to stop an invasion of people who do not belong here. The President of the United States should have smacked that Mexican President in the eye for the remarks he made on our property. Mexican is not a race. It is a nationality. Aztecs were never in New Mexico, Arizona, Texas or California. I am not anti anyone except Democrat for they would sell our Nation out from under us for power but Mexico has no claim on any part of America as they sold the disputed states. Besides, there was not Mexico before the Spanish established a state of Mexico in the new world. La Raza is a lie.
In other words: f–k the facts, you hate Hispanics, and no amount of evidence will alter your position.
This is rich. Reynolds writes comedy and he is blissfully unaware of his folly. This is evidence?
Those proficiency scores are through the roof. Not even renowned high schools like Princeton High School are hitting on all cylinders:
What’s even funnier is the irony of this statement “f–k the facts, you hate Hispanics, and no amount of evidence will alter your position” in that Reynolds remains oblivious to his tunnel vision which results in him writing this missive after evidence has been presented which has invalidated his position. The inconvenient evidence is of no consequence because Reynolds is on a moral mission to preen and posture for all to see and the most efficient way of preening and posturing is to condemn others who don’t drink his kool-aid. Logic and self-awareness are jettisoned as encumbrances to mission #1 – preening.
Ya know, Michael, I think we can say without a doubt that Tangoman is NOT Peter Brimelow. Brimelow, for all his deficiencies as a commentator, at least seems like a semi-articulate dude. Tangoman, though, seems like a college kid with a word-a-day calendar.
Take this bit of incoherence:
You got that, Mike. You’re oblivious to your tunnel vision. (Ummm…tunnel vision works as a metaphor, but how can you be oblivious to it? Tunnel vision does obscure one’s vision, but it does so in an obvious way.)
Then look at the clunky sentence structure. It’s just a bunch of phrases strung together in the most awkward way possible. “remains oblivious,” “writing this missive,” “evidence has been presented,” “invalidated his position.” Take any one of those and make a sentence out of it. Jam them all into one, though…
Idea-wise, Tangoman could be Brimelow. Skill-wise, though, I just don’t think he has the goods.
“What’s next? Will economists also declare that it is not clear that high school drop-outs are net cost to society?”
Illegals use services, but they also pay taxes. They also do menial labor that, it appears, no one else wants to do. So, there are costs and benefits. You can cherry pick studies that look only at costs, but that is not honest. You should balance off benefits. This is not controversial at all as I am sure you know. Since they are illegal, it is not possible to have perfect data, so that is why I say it is not clear. There is certainly no indirect evidence that they have a large negative impact.
Illegals have been here in large numbers for a long time. We should have convincing evidence by now in states that have large illegal populations if their presence adversely affects the economy.
Steve
Illegals have been here in large numbers for a long time. We should have convincing evidence by now in states that have large illegal populations if their presence adversely affects the economy.
Yes, we should. We could look at the trajectory that California has traveled between 1965 and 2010. I wonder what we’d discover.
Illegals use services, but they also pay taxes.
Certainly they do. When your kids, because they so love their dad, buy you a balloon on your visit to DisneyWorld, a vacation that has otherwise been financed by you, then they’ve paid their way, right? Hopefully that’s not the argument that you’re trying to advance. Any payment of taxes equates to a balancing of the services that are used.
They also do menial labor that, it appears, no one else wants to do.
Should we trust appearances or data?
# Maids and housekeepers: 55 percent native-born
# Taxi drivers and chauffeurs: 58 percent native-born
# Butchers and meat processors: 63 percent native-born
# Grounds maintenance workers: 65 percent native-born
# Construction laborers: 65 percent native-born
# Porters, bellhops, and concierges: 71 percent native-born
# Janitors: 75 percent native-born
You can cherry pick studies that look only at costs, but that is not honest. You should balance off benefits.
I agree that it is not honest to cherry-pick studies, which is why I’ve repeatedly linked to two major studies on this issue published by the National Academies of Science Press and commissioned by the National Research Council. They did exhaustive work and referenced many papers which looked at the costs and benefits and issued a three-part conclusion on net effects which broke down the analysis by immigrant education status. Immigrants who have not graduated high school are, as a group, huge net losses to the economy. Now if you can convince me that the hordes crossing the Southern border are, in fact, all college graduates, then I will concede defeat on my point, for college graduates produce more in benefits for the economy than they consume in costs.
There is certainly no indirect evidence that they have a large negative impact.
The devil here is in the details. What is considered a “large enough negative impact?”
Herb:
I know, that bothered me, too. I’m trying to get him to spell the word “traveler.” If he uses two ll’s he’s a Brit, which makes him Brimelow. Failing that I have to get him to pronounce the word “lieutenant” with an “f.” I’m puzzled as to how to do that.
This is what I mean when I say you don’t have the goods, Tangoman.
Is that because they’re immigrants…or because they haven’t graduated high school?
Is that because they’re immigrants…or because they haven’t graduated high school?
This yapping at my heels is pathetic. The answer to your question was the very next sentence.
Sorry, Tango. I asked you if the “huge net loss to the economy” was caused by their lack of education or their immigration status.
This:
is not an answer.
That’s restating your premise with different phrasing. Yes, I concede that educated people “produce more in benefits for the economy” than non-educated people.
But what does that have to do with one’s immigration status?
Are you okay with illegal immigrants provided they have college degrees? Would you make an exception for the uneducated illegal immigrant who wants to go to college?
My guess, based on views you’ve previously espoused, is that your answer would be NO. That leads me to believe that education status really isn’t the sticking point you claim it is.
Indeed, the language you use betrays you, such as:
“the hordes crossing the Southern border”
Tango, I’ve tried and tried and tried to explain this to you: The problem is bigger than that.
What, nothing about the Africans in sham marriages?
The white Europeans who skate by because everyone assumes a white European has to be legal? Nothing about the Canadians pretending to be from Michigan?
Nothing about the Asians, who are more likely to cross the Canadian border than the Mexican one anyway?
Nope, it’s always “the hordes crossing the Southern border.” Talk about yapping at the heels…
Are you okay with illegal immigrants provided they have college degrees?
Simple answer: No.
Detailed answer: These immigrants are lessening the tax burden for citizens in that they’re arriving and are net-tax contributors, thus increasing the base of taxpayers that subsidize the net-tax beneficiaries in the citizenry. They’d also likely be more law abiding, have fewer social maladies, etc than our own lower classes, thus diluting the influence of social maladies that are socialized to all people in society. The principle problems here would be the willful violation of American national sovereignty and the imposition of their presence rather than having been invited. The balancing of the benefits against principle is what is at stake here. I’d still favor principle but I’d be very willing to compromise on the issue of Amnesty. Very willing. I still want Americans to control the American border and I want immigrants to be invited and not impose their presence on the rest of us.
Would you make an exception for the uneducated illegal immigrant who wants to go to college?
How would this be possible? You can’t commute from the US to Mexico on a daily basis to partake of Mexican educational facilities and not impose costs on American society while you’re unproductive and consuming services and resources and infrastructure capacity. Has this illegal arrived with a $250,000 bond which we tap to finance this part of their life?
Joking aside, I know what you’re saying but there are American citizens who have higher claim to social welfare spending than do illegal aliens who’ve imposed their presence on us. Why would I care about their intention to seek higher education when there are plenty of Americans who share the same goal?
My suggestion is that if the plight of illegals in this situation is of concern to you that you send a $10,000 payment every year to a randomly selected deserving young Latin American citizen and help them achieve this goal and then counsel them on how to apply for legal immigrant status. If you want to feel good about yourself, then pay the freight out of your own pocket rather than agitating to stick the taxpayers with these costs so that you can reap the boost to your self-esteem.
Not to be a literary critic, but when I said you sound like a college kid with a word-a-day calendar, I was referring to stuff like this:
Does that make more sense if you translate it into Spanish? You sound like the Architect from the Matrix.
I don’t think you picked up on the subtext. What I’m saying is that your arguments are disingenuous. An immigrant’s education level is only relevant…when it’s convenient for Tangoman’s arguments.
Sadly, disingenuous arguments are not solutions to real problems.
What, pray tell, do you propose doing about Ghanaians in sham marriages or Koreans overstaying their visas? Any ideas?
Not to be a literary critic . . .
Why do you hate diversity so much? My writing style is different than yours. Embrace diversity. Diversity is our strength. Don’t be so small minded and so threatened by your inadequacies.
On a more serious note, it must suck to be you, to be unable to engage in a discussion of ideas and instead always feeling the need to attack the person you’re debating. Hey, I get it, if you come unarmed to a battle of wits then use whatever meager tool you can find to try to remain in the battle. It’s just sad to watch thus play out in public.
What, pray tell, do you propose doing about Ghanaians in sham marriages or Koreans overstaying their visas? Any ideas?
Sham marriages: prosecute both parties when there is sufficient probable cause to suspect fraud. Upon conviction institute harsh penalties.
Visa overstays: deport as soon as apprehension is made. Prohibit re-entry for deported person. If patterns emerge, tweak visa policy for country. If there are indications of large scale organized effort, seek foreign government cooperation to break apart the organized ring which is involved and/or break apart the organization that is present in the US.
The wit!
Ya know, T, I’m sorry I criticized your writing style. You seem like a pretty nice kid and if we were to sit down for a beer, we’d probably get a long. (Not that I endorse underage drinking.)
Tell you what, I’ll ease off on the literary criticism if that makes you feel better.
Onto the substance:
Yes, that’s the way we already do it.
Yes, yes, good ideas, some of them that are already in place.
My larger point, Tango, is the approach you favor –more border security, employer enforcement, etc– is only going to address one small piece of the larger problem.
How is employer enforcement going to catch the guy who runs his own taco truck?
How is more border security going to stop the African from marrying a friend of a friend for a green card?
If we want to truly tackle this issue, and I think we should, we’re going to need more than slogans from Joe Arpaio and Tom Tancredo. We need serious people taking serious steps.
And sadly, we’re going to need more government…more government prosecutors, more court-appointed defense lawyers, more investigators, more prison guards.
And guess what? There’s no appetite for that kind of thing. The government is the problem, remember? That’s what the Republicans keep telling us, right?
Government’s the problem and the market’s the solution.
Which may be why ICE detention facilities are managed by the GEO Group, eh?
One has to love the logic of the cheap labor Republicans. They will drive the country into the ditch if given the chance to make life easier for Perdue Chicken and Wal-Mart.
Poor, illiterate illegal aliens pay little if any in taxes. They know how to cheat the system and have support groups that let them reclaim all of their income taxes and get tax credits.
In addition, the high crime rate requirement more spent law enforcement. See that fact that over 20% on inmate in California are illegal aliens. Illiterate parents require more money spent on schools.
Illegal aliens pay littel if any taxes but require more local government spending, more social welfare programs, more school spending. In addition car insurance is more expensive in areas with large number of illegal aliens due to their refusal to purchase car insurance.
Look at identity theft. It is a market created by immigrants and who see it as just another way to steal from whites.
Gringos like Michael are stupid in their belief that illegal aliens are honest, hard working people when in reality they are thieves and scammers who are quite happy to steal from people like Michael.
Imagine what taxes will be like in 2050 when the U.S. is less than 50-% May the current conditions in a city like Los Angeles will be the model: high taxes, few whites, powerful government unions, and zero effort at controlling costs because the gringos will always be stuck with the bill.
You can’t be serious, superdestroyer. Sounds like you’re informed more by “how you think it is” rather than “how it is.”
Depends on which taxes you’re talking about. Income taxes on their under-the-counter cash jobs? Probably not.
But where do you get the illegal immigrant card that exempts you from sales tax? I want one. Whenever an illegal immigrant fills their gas tank, buys groceries, or pays their phone bill…they pay taxes. Just like everyone else, citizen, tourist, or illegal immigrant.
Studies have consistently shown that the crime rate for illegal immigrants is NOT significantly higher than the crime rate for citizens.
(Also, if 20% of California’s inmates are illegal immigrants, doesn’t that mean 80% of California’s inmates are NOT illegal immigrants?)
Objectively untrue. Being an illegal immigrant disqualifies you from all kinds of social welfare programs. Look it up. The immigrants you see on welfare? They’re legal .
O RLY? White meth addicts never steal identities? Uh huh….
PS…Why just mention white people? Can’t an illegal immigrant steal from a black guy? Or an Asian guy? Hell, can’t an illegal immigrant be white himself?
Wouldn’t it be more likely that an illegal immigrant from Mexico would steal a Hispanic citizen’s identity? Mr. Crossed-the-Rio-This-Morning is going to be more believable as a Lopez or Rodriguez than a Smith, right?
Frankly, that you substituted “whites” in place of “citizens” tells me all I need to know about which angle you’re attacking this from.
And if you think I’m calling you a racist…okay, well, maybe I am.
Tangoman. Dude. The line that made me say “yowza” was this one:
That was actually so far around the bend with racial paranoia (a white Vermont hide-out) that I really thought it could be a troll. A sock-puppet. A creative writer. You joined in there:
Dude. If you can’t draw a line between you and “the few white left will pack themselves into a few places like Vermont,” if you’ve got to try to make that paranoia work (by shifting it to a different argument), then something is seriously wrong.
You know, I didn’t pay terribly great attention to your discussions with Michael Reynolds. Either you were who he said you were, or you weren’t. Either you were an actual racist or something else. I actually leaned toward the idea that you were a sort of autistic libertarian, someone stuck on facts you perceived other people to ignore.
Ah, stepping up for “white Vermont” kind of shreds those other explanations. I’m afraid I must give you less credit going forward.
charles austin: I understand now. Yes, Reagan’s bill was authentic amnesty.
(Just heard a TV commercial out here in Californa where the guy, Poizner, says “Meg Whitman would move illegals to the back of the line for citizenship, that’s amnesty.”
No, it’s not.
I personally find both Poizner and Whitman somewhat unlikable.)
john personna,
Maybe you should point to the majority Hispanic cities where whites are moving to instead of moving out of. Maybe you could point to the high school or university that is majority black or Hispanic that the white kids want to go to.
Look at the schools where the leadership of the U.S. send their children. Sidwell Friends is 80% white and Hispanic (President Obama), Jewish Day school is 100% white (Rahm Emanuel), prep school is 99% white (Joe Biden), Trinity School in NYC 90% white and Asians (the daughter and grand dauther of Ruth Bader Ginsberg).
As the total number of whites in California (as soon to start happening in TExas).
Look at the list of best places in the U.S. to live http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bplive/2009/index.html, few Hispanic seems to help making the list. Then look at the worst places in the U.S. to live in the U.S. The heavily Hispanic cities in California climb to the top of the list.
Of course, the only response to any post is to scream racism. Of course, such a claim is humorous since Hispanics have a huge number of support mechanism that blue collar whites just do not have including all of the government’s race based programs.
If you want to change immigraiton, eliminate all race or ethnicity based government programs, remove support for ethnic or race based organizations, seal the borders for at least a decade before amnesty, end anchor babies, end chain migration, and deport immigrants who refuse to learn English with a short period of time.
Of course, the cheap labor Republicans like race based pander programs, love it that Hispanic immigrants are poor, illiterate, and only speak Spanish. Keeping them poor, uneducated, and isolated make them more dependent on big government and creates more power for the government.
Maybe open borders, unlimited immigration Republicans are just the same as big government, nanny state Republicans.
Man, that sounds like a lot to do…
Why don’t we just deport all racists and call it good?
Herb,
Thank you for proving that the pro-open border, pro-unlimited immgiration, pro-cheap labor Republicans have no arguments in their favor. The only answer is the scream racism.
What is more racist: invading a country, stealing an identify, cheating on taxes, and commiting crimes or saying that the U.S. should be organized for Americans first and that the benefits Americans.
I guess that the cheap-labor, big government Republicans just cannot resist the idea of a large number of poor, uneducated, isolated people who will work for cheap and not ask question. To bad that the private sector could produce jobs that were worthy of Americans instead of producing jobs that pay third world wages and produce a third world standard of living.
You can’t prove a negative. Neaner neaner.
But seriously…
I can’t see how you can complain about “the scream racism” (the racism scream?) in one breath and the next go on a rant about the “large number of poor, uneducated, isolated people” you don’t like. Okay, so no racism.
It’s just plain hatism then.
Herb,
Give five economic or social reason why the U.S should have opne borders and unlimited immigration (also known as amensty for everyone who gets across the border). Does it increase the number of high paying jobs? Does it lower taxes” Does it make the government smaller? Does it amek it easier to live in any part of the country? Will it make housing cheaper? Maybe you can point to the Department of Education studies that show that white children are not adversely affect by being in a majority Hispanic school.
Short of cheaper lawn care, dry wall, and an endless supply of minimum wage employee, how does it benefit the U.S. to have open borders and unlimited immigraiton. Where are the blue collar whites suppose to live when the country in that looks like a barrio. Who are blue collar whites suppose to improve their lives when they get no benefit from affirmative action, 8a contracting set asides, quotas, in a country that is less than half white?
My guess is that you cannot support any claims that must resort to the cry of racism to make up for the lack of credible arguments for open borders and unlimited immigration.
“Yes, we should. We could look at the trajectory that California has traveled between 1965 and 2010. I wonder what we’d discover.”
The world’s 8th (7th?) largest economy. Silicon Valley. Many of our leading universities (look at where CalTech, Stanford and UC Berkeley rate). While I am not an expert on California, I follow it enough that it looks to me as though its problems largely stem from the initiatives. Voters keep voting themselves benefits, but vote against tax increases. TBH, the legislature does some of the same. We know where that goes.
California has been beset with large influxes of immigrants for a long time, yet has been a major growth engine for a long time.
From your National Research Council I find the following.
“. According to these calculations, the federal government realized a net fiscal gain of about $51 billion in 1994 from the presence of immigrants and their concurrent descendants. At the same time, there were net fiscal costs of $27 billion per year incurred in total by a subset of state and local governments…..
In a separate study, we analyzed the fiscal impact of immigrants in a forward-looking longitudinal model. For each age at arrival and education level, we calculated the impact of the immigrant and all future descendants by projecting their survival, fertility, return migration, educational attainment, taxes, and benefits (see Lee and Miller, 1997; National Research Council, 1997:Chap. 7). In that analysis, we also calculated the average impact of immigrants, weighting by the age and educational composition of recently arrived immigrants. The average present value (over a 300-year horizon and expressed in 1996 dollars) of the stream of net fiscal impacts of an immigrant arriving in 1994 to state and local governments combined is -$25,000, to the federal government $105,000, and overall is $80,000 per immigrant admitted. For the purpose of comparison, we can multiply these present values by the interest rate (3%) to convert to annual flows: -$750 at the state and local levels, $3,150 at the federal level, and a combined annualized fiscal impact of $2,400 per immigrant. Page 199 Smith and Edmonston, The Immigration Debate.
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=5985&page=199
Reading through their literature, they concentrate on taxes, not on indirect costs or benefits. They do not consistently, from my brief readings, support the idea of immigration as a net negative or positive, but rather have studies supporting both sides, as quoted above.
Steve
superdestroyer, you are asking us to disprove racist arguments in one breath, and then crying foul that anyone find them racist in the next.
Maybe you just don’t get what racism means. As an example, this is overtly racist:
You frame this as all about choice based on race, and not say on property values and school scores. There are direct measures of school quality, rankings.
To make it simple for you: A non-racist parent looks for good schools. A racist parent looks for white schools.
John,
The statistical evidence is that even though not all majority white schools are good schools, the good schools are dominated by whites and Asians. The more Hispanics or blacks in a school, the less chance of it being a quality school. The left has had 50 years to show that it is capable of educating blacks and Hipsnics and the results have been an unmitigated failure. One of the reasons that the left hate NCLB, it that is showned that the Hispanic and white students in the good, white schools were underperforming.
When you find the blue dog Hispanic politicians, th emiddle class Hispanics who are fighting to get their children into tier one universities.
Even you ever want to see the failure of Hispanic culture, look up how few college athletes are Hispanic. Why do the cheap labor Republicans want to into tens of millions of poor, illiterates from a sexist, racist culture that hates innovation, technical advancement, or economic success. Why do the open border Republicans want to turn the U.S. into Espanola, New Mexico.
Steve,
You are claiming that poor illiterate Hispanics fill the knowledge worker spots in Silicon Valley. How many illegal aliens work in Hollywood?
Yes, upper class Asians are good from a macroeconomic point of view. However, how many of those companies bother to hire Americans versus hiring H1B visa holders.
If we are going to discuss poor illegal Hispanic immigrants, then you need to discuss the economic impact of poor Hispanics. If you look at New Mexico, the state with the highest percentage of the population that is Hispanic, then you are looking at a state below Alabama in economic output and totally dependent of government spending and people educated outside the state.
And yes, the UC system is good but the Cal State system is a disaster. Even then most of the high tech workers are from outside the state and UC-Irvine is basically an all Asian student university.
The bill that Reagan signed into law 20 years ago is part of the problem we’re having today. The enforcement part was ignored and after that everyone thought, you know if I just get in and make myself at home, they’ll eventually let me stay.
No amnesty. No touch back. Up the numbers that can enter legally because they need to be increased. Go back and get in line to enter legally. I don’t care if they’ve been here 15 days or 15 months or 15 years. If they are caught in the country illegally they don’t get a chance to come in legally. Ever. The sooner they go back the sooner they can apply and work through the process.
“You are claiming that poor illiterate Hispanics fill the knowledge worker spots in Silicon Valley.”
I did not say that. I was responding to Tango’s comment about California and its economy trajectory since 1965.
“If we are going to discuss poor illegal Hispanic immigrants, then you need to discuss the economic impact of poor Hispanics.”
I did. I quoted from what I take to be an approved site, since Tango recommended it and he strongly opposes illegal immigration as should be apparent from his comments. That site suggests that illegals pay in more tax than they use, but that it is not distributed equally.
Is New Mexico a problem because of immigrants? Did it have a thriving economy at some point in the past before an influx of illegals? I do not know, but suspect we can find out. There might be reasons other than illegals for their plight. Still, if Tango’s reference source is correct, they may be hurting at least partially from illegals, while the rest of us benefit. That could be corrected by redistribution or cutting down on the number of illegals. We dont appear to know how to do the latter. (See 1776-present)
Steve
How is employer enforcement going to catch the guy who runs his own taco truck?
By-law inspectors are always around. Food vendors have to be licensed to operate and they need to be licensed by health authorities as well. So, during licensing we verify immigration status. If a front is used to disguise the true ownership, then during spot-checks out in the field, verify the immigration status of every vendor.
While I am not an expert on California, I follow it enough that it looks to me as though its problems largely stem from the initiatives.
What initiative caused this outcome?
It’s true, back in the mid-60s California was the golden state and they had one of the highest, if not the highest, student achievement rankings in the Union. Now they’re second from the bottom. Have initiatives worked to change the population composition from the mid-60s to present day? How exactly have initiatives worked to depress student achievement so drastically?
On the broader questions of economic performance and California’s ranking, how much lag effect are you factoring into your assessment? The same situation that the Chief Demographer of Texas in highlighting is also present in California. When the people who staff the companies which are operating in California retire they’ll have to be replaced by a younger generation. If we posit a closed system these companies will be drawing from smaller and smaller pools of qualified applicants. What of the rest of the population? What of the companies who can’t staff from California sources? Sure, in an open system migration between states is the safety valve which equalizes some of these pressures, but that migration works in both directions – talented people coming to California to work in their dynamic corporations and also talented people leaving California, dynamic corp. leaving California and struggling people leaving California. The simple fact is that when the State has the 2nd lowest student achievement results in the US the talent pipeline is atrophied and that dynamic economy can’t run as efficiently with dullards substituting for intelligent employees. We’re already seeing the lag effect kicking in when we look at the income distribution data for California. A growing lower class over time, an ever expanding reliance on social welfare expenditures being directed to help those on the lower end of the SES.
People are the foundation upon which society is built. Human capital indices in California are moving in the wrong direction. This is destabilizing the foundation and these destabilizing effects will propagate their way through the superstructure.
In a separate study, we analyzed the fiscal impact of immigrants in a forward-looking longitudinal model. For each age at arrival and education level, we calculated the impact of the immigrant and all future descendants by projecting their survival, fertility, return migration, educational attainment, taxes, and benefits
Your quoted selection is an inclusive study of all immigrants, legal and illegal. I’ve never argued that engineers who arrive from Germany, or scientists who arrive from Japan, or executives who arrive from Canada, etc are not net tax contributors. So, keep reading through the study until you get to the break-down of costs grouped by education level.
Secondly, keep in mind the structural flaw that is likely built into their 300-year longitudinal model. They used historical data on past immigrants and their descendants to forecast income streams forward 300 years. That historical data swept in the immigrant dynamics occurring during the post-war years, when the labor situation was characterized by high levels of union representation, wages above market-clearing rates, less representation of knowledge workers in the general economy. In terms of descendant characteristics, we’re already seeing a divergence between Hispanic descendant performance and past trends of immigrant descendant performance. The upshot here is that the net income projection are going to be on the optimistic side because present immigrants are not going to operate in a labor environment as favorable as in the past and their descendants aren’t performing to historical standards.
Lastly, if you wish to make the case that the composition of illegal aliens is identical, or near to identical, as that of the legal immigrant population, in terms of education, income, family characteristics, then please do so. I’ll entertain your argument with an open mind. I’d really appreciate any effort on your part to sprinkle the data with case histories of Mexican PhDs in neurobiology who snuck across the border so that they can become pizza delivery boys in Phoenix.
You frame this as all about choice based on race, and not say on property values and school scores.
Confounded variables.
To make it simple for you: A non-racist parent looks for good schools. A racist parent looks for white schools.
That’s rich. A simpleton offering to simplify the point. What happens when both the “racist” and “non-racist” parents enroll their kids in the same school because both believe that the school met their criteria?
. That site suggests that illegals pay in more tax than they use, but that it is not distributed equally.
Not illegals, immigrants. Immigrants of all educational levels.
Look, validate your intuition. If you honestly believe that illegals are paying more in taxes than they consume in services, knowing how many of them work outside the tax reporting system and how many have children who go to public schools, then compare that outcome to the situation of American citizens who are high school drop-outs and ask why we bother to encourage kids to finish school, for clearly they will, as a group, become net tax contributors. Does that make sense to you?
“Meg Whitman would move illegals to the back of the line for citizenship, that’s amnesty.”
No, it’s not.
Yes, it is. Being granted legal status but being put at the back of the line to attain citizenship status simply means that the illegal will now qualify for almost every single social program we offer, will continue to work in their place of employment, their kids will still go to the same school, and what they’ll have to wait to attain is the right to sit on a jury, the right to vote, and they’ll be prohibited from being employed in some jobs which require citizenship status.
Meanwhile, people who have applied to immigrate legally are waiting for years and decades in their home countries before being granted approval.
Being put at the back of the line means that illegals are denied the benefits of living in the US and cannot enter legally until all of the applicants for legal immigration have arrived here.
Giving illegals almost all of the benefits and then putting them at the back of the line for citizenship status is Amnesty.
You are conflating something else with citizenship there. Are you worried about work residency? That is not an immigration issue (to go autistic back at you), and I think innacurate to boot:
Can you show me where Whitman has supported visas for all illegal residents? Where she does not support returning illegals?
Can you show me where Whitman has supported visas for all illegal residents? Where she does not support returning illegals?
To be clear, my comment was prompted by your conclusion “No, it’s not” moreso than Whitman’s position. However, I’ll clarify the point you ask above.
As this report makes clear Whitman has shifted her position on “earned legalization” to one of “temporary guest worker program” but I, like many, believe that this puts change of status before consequence and we’ve all been burned by such promises from government. What will they do when the “temporary” period expires? Just renew it again. And again. And again. No deportations. No self-deportations. This is functional amnesty. Illegals get to stay under a new category and there is no promise that once that status is achieved that there won’t be calls to reform the “temporary guest worker program” into a pathway for permanent status and then a pathway to citizenship.
This is a bait and switch. If she doesn’t support deportation now then it’s almost certain that she won’t support deportation after the expiration of the “temporary guest worker visa” condition has expired.
In other words, no. Whitman did not back amnesty.
BTW, this is pure comedy gold:
So now anyone wanting comprehensive immigration reform is backing the federal policy.
Good thing you don’t want comprehensive immigration reform, eh?
In other words, no. Whitman did not back amnesty.
Sure she did, and I say this while appreciating her other positions on illegals. If she’s in favor of providing a legal means of allowing these illegals to stay in America simply by creating a new legal status and then declaring that the illegals now all qualify as “temporary guest workers” her on a visa, then she’s supported an effort to grant them an amnesty from deportation.
So now anyone wanting comprehensive immigration reform is backing the federal policy.
Good thing you don’t want comprehensive immigration reform, eh?
The ABC analysis was correct. If communication is to be effective we can’t engage in defining things to mean what we want them to mean. I don’t support Comprehensive Immigration Reform precisely because in its effort to comprehensively address the problem it seeks to avoid deporting all of the illegals. If you have reference to “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” plans which plan to fully deport all of the illegals who invaded then link it up baby, link it.