Immigration Policy Solved

[gulliver]

Here is a potential position for Dems.

o Did these marchers that worry you so much cross the border under Clinton or Bush? What happened to our borders? Why is this crunch happening now under Republican rule when it never happened before?

o Grant them citizenship. Stop choking and gasping for a minute and listen (er, read). As I am arguing in my other thread on H-1Bs and L-1s, lower wages for citizens are rooted in immigration law hanky-panky by business interests. The labor and the people (the energy and atoms of the equation) are already in this country. We can't pretend they aren't -- based on flimsy, unenforced (under Bush especially) abstractions we call immigration laws. The people and skills are here, and it is a foolish conceit to think we have the cojones, political will, and police wherewithal to boot them out. But if they are legal, they will start asking for what they are worth, and current citizens can compete again. I wonder what happens to the value of existing homes if the roof that was put on at $7/hr would have to be replaced at $15.

o Enforce border security with real measures, not fake ones like fences and border patrols. A national ID.

o Ease immigration restrictions so that more people can come here legally.

On edit: Changed headline to be more provocative.

[OneBlueSky]

1. you lost me with the national ID . . . n/t

.

[gulliver]

2. You already have one. Several in fact.

It's your name, your SSN, your credit card number, your phone number, your address. We are in the computer age. The database technology needed to know who you are is already in place and being used. We seem to live in denial. It is costing us.

[OregonBlue]

3. Maybe not national ID but national verification of Social Security

numbers. Also, do not grant citizenship, after verification of identify and criminal record, grant landed immigrant status. I was a landed immigrant in Canada which allowed me to work, pay into social insurance, receive health care, etc. I was given a social insurance number that was used as my healthcare number and my national driving insurance number.

I could not vote for national offices but I could participate in all provincial and local elections. I could run for provicial and local elections. I could have remained in Canada the rest of my life as a landed immigrant. Once landed, I had to go through the process like anyone else to apply for citizenship which included NOT being arrested and NOT collecting Social Assistance.

[gulliver]

4. I like the idea of a "gradual citizenship" ... based on good behavior.

That's a really good concept (landed immigrant). It takes some of the political edge off. Still, the fear of giving them full citizenship is rooted in illusions about what exactly is really within our power. We and they are paying for it through the nose. Business interests enrich themselves on ill-gotten low labor that can only be achieved by special GOP legal derivitives. Create laws for political reasons, but don't enforce them. It's one of the biggest tools in their arsenal for sucking wealth upward.

The knee-jerk terror of a national ID (I kind of wince about it myself) is based on an illusion. We kid ourselves when we think we can do things like raise fences along the Mexican border (SDI-like madness that), increase border patrols, create massive domestic police actions. We're just foolish if we think we can do that.

We kid ourselves when we think we don't already have a national identity too. If I am in a store and they ask me for my driver's license, I show that too them. My driver's license establishes my unique "universal ID" right then and there. A national ID is no different. Computers are getting fast enough to fuse a state driver's license, credit card, phone number etc., into a de facto national ID anyway.

Politics is the art of the possible, though, and a "real" national ID seems scary.

[OregonBlue]

5. I agree about the national ID but we NEED to verify social security

numbers for everyone working in this country. It's going to be a hard one for many Americans (liberals and libertarians) but it has to be done!

As a landed immigrant, people can run and vote for local and state offices, therefore they have representation. They can legally work, vote, drive, etc. but they cannot break the law of live off of the state.

They must remain in the country 3 out of every 5 years to maintain their status. That way they don't get status and then leave the country to return whenever it suits them. But it allows them to return to their countries of origin for long periods of time when they need to for personal or economic reasons without loosing their right to return and work.

Why haven't the Dems come out with a new proposal like this instead of rehashing the OLD TIRED arguments of yesteryear? When are they gonna grow some balls.

I'm tired of them trying to play both sides of the fence!!