what to do with ~12million illegal immigrants

[sabbat hunter]

obviously we cannot round them up and send them back to hteir home countries. just the costs and logistics of doing so are a nightmare.

step 1)if you are found to have hired an illegal immigrant you are fined 1 million dollars, which doubles for each additional illegal immigrant under your employ
2) a limited amnesty program. if you want to stay in the US and become a US citizen, then you must for a period of 2 years join the armed forces or an alternative national service.
3) after the period of national service is up allow immediate family members to come to the US. if they are over 18 they are subject to the same national service requirements.

[Jed Dilligan]

1. Three bad ideas

1. Do you really think this would be enforced against Con-Agra, Dennys, McDonalds, etc? What we'd get is a lot of independent contractors and mom-and-pop business fined and driven out of business, and then the corpos who can protect themselves (and still use illegal labor) would swoop in.

2. Yes, that's what we need: a much bigger army.

3. See 2.

[sabbat hunter]

7. noticie what i said about 2,3

the armed forces OR other national service (like a domestic peace corps), the choice would be up to the individual.

please read everything.

you need those heavy fines to prevent the companies from hiring illegals. make the fines so high that no one will hire them.


and as a 4th point i would greatly increase legal immigration

[iconocrastic]

33. Open borders are the only solution

Freedom should not depend on artificial borders.

[klyon]

37. open borders has never worked and will never work

This whole thing, like everything else in our society, is out of balance. We need to rethink economics and start building good economies, you must build from local to international not sellout to international at the expense of local. If no one can afford to buy, you won't see any. We need a thriving middle class.

This is Mexico's problem to built their own economy, ours must first sustain us. Mexico has been and still is corrupt and the money from illegal drugs is fueling alot of it. Legalizing drugs would get the money out. A large part of Mexico's income is from workers here sending money home, that is why they are here. If Mexico where to provide jobs and an economy for their people, they wouldn't be here.

We must have an organized fair process for becoming "legal". Cheap labor is the outcome of over supply.

[dave_p]

40. Open borders worked before WW1

33 million entered the US under effectively open borders, and 25 million of them stayed. Most of the world worked on a similar basis, but the US drew in most of the intercontinental migrants and far outgrew its cometitors in economic terms.

Mexico's problem goes far beyond corruption: it's absurd to claim that poor countries are poor just because some official takes a bribe. If illegal drug money's going into Mexico I don't see how "getting the money out" will raise incomes: the same goes for remittances.

Cheap labor is the outcome of many things, among them weak labor protection, excessive corporate power and a tax system favoring income concentration. "Oversupply" isn't the reason, bad distribution is.

[nadinbrzezinski]

51. And 35 of neoliberal policies first by the PRI

and now by the PAN... truly going hard core wiht Dela Madric, and Lopez Portillo

:-)

[Greyhound]

24. Your argument assumes complicity with corruption, if this continues to be

accepted practice, there is no point to doing anything about any of the problems we face, for we are already lost and it is time to start investing in guns and grain.

Can you eliminate it entirely? Of course not, but even a few demonstrations will be sufficient to change the landscape.

We had a case in AZ back in the mid 80's when virtually every resort in PV and Scottsdale adopted on unofficial policy of hiring nothing but illegals in all of the "back of the house" departments because they were really cheap. INS raided one resort (Mountain Shadows), effectively shutting it down for about 2 days (managers doing the housekeeping was fucking hilarious), and lo and behold, the next day the newspapers were full of ads offering good jobs throughout the industry.

It took almost 2 years before they were back to business as usual.

[Jed Dilligan]

32. Something to be said for "doing nothing"

Local government is better than state government is better than federal government at actually fixing problems. I bet the initiative in the situation you describe came from locals, not from INS noticing stuff going on in Arizona.

The Federal government has always been a corrupt tool of business interests. I would rather they do nothing than screw a bunch of folks who don't deserve it--the people I buy stuff from every day, whom I'd rather give my money too than Wal-Mart.

[Greyhound]

38. You would lose, the locals, residents and governments (Scottsdale and Paradise Valley)

Love the illegals doing taking those jobs. The situation just became too blatant and there were too many unemployed citizens for them to ignore.

Just as you were wrong to support Raygun in the 80's which made all this possible. I assume you supported him since you are quoting his propaganda in your reply.

Government at all levels has been unduly influenced by business, but it is simply untrue to say that it has more influence at the federal level than lower (try to get your arguments considered at the next meeting of your city council in opposition to your local auto dealership or any other employer). It is just the opposite, and it has only been recently that the federal government has become a wholly owned subsidiary of corporate interests, and this too is thanks to the Raygun propaganda machine.

[Jed Dilligan]

41. Too young to support anyone in the eighties.

But the Federal government "Raygun" left us, I'm happy to see die a slow death.

[Greyhound]

42. Then read more. The alternative that you would create is much worse then you realize.

We got a large federal government in response to the tyranny of "strong" local governments.

"Strong" local government gave us literal and virtual slavery.


"Strong" local government gave us racial and sexual segregation.


"Strong" local government gave us criminal fiefdoms throughout our country.


"Strong" local government gave us Tammany Hall and Ryan's machine.

There are many problems with the power of the federal government, but they can be addressed by our representatives from all over the country, whereas local government provides no avenue of dissent other than from the federal level.

[Jed Dilligan]

43. Had a long response but it glitched out

I'm not unaware of the things you speak of. In fact, I read quite a bit. I've read enough world history to have some distance on the United States, which I tend to think of as a doomed experiment.

California pays more to be in the Union than we get out of it. All we get is a government trying to force us to welcome polluters and deciding how we can and can't treat the sick. Not to mention wars we never supported.

If us getting the hell out of this thing means slavery or theocracy somewhere else, that's terrible. But I don't feel any more responsible for these things in the U.S. than I do for them abroad, and with our fading resources I'm afraid we can't use force to fix those problems everywhere.

[Greyhound]

46. I understand you feelings, I lived there for over a decade before I found I just couldn't stand it

anymore. California's problems are almost entirely the fault of Californians, not the federal governments.

They have created the worst of both world there, a left-wing police state largely controlled by the most ignorantly greedy right-wing assholes imaginable. The country's largest state has their capital and legislature in a Podunk berg in the middle of nowhere with no understanding of the needs and problems in the rest of the state. The amazingly ignorant population gleefully elect the most brazenly corrupt officials and then whine because nothing gets done. These officials coincidentally become multi-millionaires while holding offices that pay barely livable wages, and yet they are sent back time after time.

Not that any of this is unique to CA, but many there do seem to believe that they are entitled to some kind of special treatment because... well I don't know why it is, but they do. Maybe it's the weather? Hollywood? Beaches?

As for the fact that you pay more in federal taxes than you receive, join the fucking club. All of us in the blue states suffer from this same problem to one degree or another, and would be far better off if we could just kick the red states out, but that ain't gonna happen either.

You have the government you elected. You got Arnie because he is a celebrity and Californians just can't resist the appeal of a box-office draw. Oh, and you got him because your Republik party managed to find the only man in the whole state that could lose to the legendarily incompetent Beige Davis, the idiot that, single-handedly, made it possible for Evergreen, Enron, and the rest, to steal the $10 billion surplus you had.

Believe me, I've lived all over this country and can assure you that California's problems are caused by Californians.

[Jed Dilligan]

47. Well, that is the Republican argument.

The stupid California electorate and corrupt state government causes all our problems. The Fed has been just marvelous here.

But I'd still rather live next door to Mexicans than federal agents....

[Greyhound]

48. Not sure what Mexicans have to do with it, certainly nothing that I mentioned,

but the fact remains that even if CA got all of its money paid out to the federal government back, it would still be a clusterfuck.

I'm not a fan of the federal government either especially for the last 25 - 30 years, but to try to blame them for all that is wrong in your state is too simplistic. Do you know that in LA, for example, many roads have been neglected for so long that the roadbeds are actually breaking up? That means they no longer can be simply repaired, but have to be rebuilt, at about 100 times the cost of repairs.

There are similar examples throughout the whole state. Like its economy, you have all been living on the equity, falling further and further behind in your payments, for decades and time is running out.

[iconocrastic]

34. Warren Buffet is a Democrat

despite your tag line

[Greyhound]

39. What does that have to do with anything? There are plenty of corporatist Democrats

just look at our choices for President, or the party "leadership".

I would also point out that the quote was given by Buffet on numerable occasions as a warning to the sheeple, who in typical ruminant fashion, completely ignored it and continue to this day to pretend there is no class war.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. Ever been to Los Angeles?

Here is a clue: they are here, they are brown, they speak spanish. Get used to it. Celebrate diversity.

re your suggestions:

1) I see, so your elderly neighbor who has an undocumented health aide caring for her should be fined 1,000,000 dollars. Good idea.

2) Great - no need for the neocon's to implement a draft to man their fucking wars, we will just use Mexicans! Brilliant.

3) Wow, such generosity is only going to encourage more of 'them' to come here.

What problem other than the 'mexican problem' are you actually trying to solve?

[sabbat hunter]

8. please re -read what i wrote

in numbers 2 and 3

armed forces OR OTHER NATIONAL SERVICE. geez cant anyone read everything i wrote and comprehend it?

[ProudDad]

14. What do

California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Texas and Oklahoma have in common?

THEY ALL USED TO BE MEXICO!!!!

Piss on ALL Flags!!!

[BobRossi]

3. My lawn needs mowing

[DBoon]

11. Hire the Anglo teenager to do it

You know, the one with the piercings and tattoos who wants to be a movie star.

The one who thinks being white and speaking English entitles them automatically to a well-paying cushy job.

[lyonn]

16. I know a 21 yr. old part time student and part time UPS worker

He is strongly considering getting mowing and trimming equipment to make some real money. Part time with UPS just doesn't pay enough for students. Mowing appears more profitable. Seasonally anyway.

[unlawflcombatnt]

22. Pay an American enough to do it -- Problem Solved

Just pay the market rate for lawn-mowing (or more), and you'll have no problem. The same goes for picking crops or any other type of labor.

And I'm still willing to go pick lettuce, if John McCain is still willing to pay me $50/hour.

[napi21]

4. I agree with punishing the employers, but why can't we approach

this problem in a different way too?

It seems to me that the biggest complaint most people have against the illegal immigrents is that they are willing to work for very low wages, thus destroying the American middle class. Why couldn't Congress establish minimum wage rates, by job type, similar to the law they have (or at least HAD before Shrub) that stated if any company was working on a Government contrace, they had to pay the prevailing wage for the area and industry?

I know I don't really care how many immigrents come here, but it really pisses me off when you see results like what has happened to industries like meat packers. Their wages were $19.00/hr. 20 years ago, and now they're making $9.00/hr! The same thing has happened to the construction industry! If the employers were forced to pay a decent rate, everyone would benefit, except of course the greedy executives who would have to give up some of their millions in bonusus.

[sabbat hunter]

10. questionb

how do you force companies to pay illegal immigrants more money?


what is happening in the meat packing industry is companies like slave-mart hire non union employees, thus pay them well below what they would have gotten in a union shop. companies like slave-mart need to be regulated, forced to allow unions to come in and organize.

[napi21]

17. I don't think I said illegal immigrants. I mean ALL employees!

Upi can't really accomplish it via minuminum wage because IMO it's unrealistic to pay the same rate to a completely untrained employee as you would to someone who has a skill, and even skills vary in degrees. What I'm trying to accomplish is to STOP everybody from accepting jobs for slave wages! I understand desparation, so I guess it is a situation of who blinks first.

As an example, I worked for a mfg. co. in South Carolina. We didn't pay slave wages, but sure didn't pay terrific ones either. A new electric company opend about 1 mile down the road. Suddenly, we were losing a LOT of employees ever week! The new comapany was paying $1.5 hour more than we were! The management of our company raised EVERYONE's rate and the departing stopped!

That's all I'm trying to say. If businesses need a job done, and NOBODY will accept their offer of a low wage, they'd have no choice but to pay more!

[sabbat hunter]

25. we need to get union membership up

IMOa big reason for the decline in wages in places like the meat packing industry is the decline in unions.

problem is right now people need the jobs and have no choice but to accept the low wage, especially when a place like slave mart drives the competition out.

[Greyhound]

23. Same thing in all of the trades. An unlimited supply of cheap labor

depresses wages, there is no way around this. Non-union carpenters 20 years ago in AZ made $14 - $20 p/hr, today they get $8 - $12 unless they're related to, or friends with, the decision makers then they can get $14 - $16. This is the same everywhere, even in union states.

[wildhorses]

5. give them a ss# and get them into our tax base NOW

:patriot:

[Warren Stupidity]

29. Oddly that would hurt us 'legals'.

Not that it isn't the right thing to do though. Currently the vast majority of undocumented workers are paying into SS without any hope of getting one dime out of it. This results in a huge bubble, tens and perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars, in the ss 'trust' fund that have no associated future recipient and are thus subsidizing (nominally) us legals. Of course as the criminal cabal in the white house is raiding the trust fund as we sit here complaining about mexicans, this is all a bit irrelevant.

[wildhorses]

36. if they had legitimate ss# this would not be a problem

we need to get them legalized and quickly.

[donco6]

6. How do you check someone's immigration status?

Any thoughts? Show a green card? Easy to get one made up, happens all the time. So do you have to make sure it's not fake, too? How can I tell? What if it *is* fake and the government decides that I "should have know it was fake"? How should I have known? Is there going to be a department set up to determine the accuracy of IDs?

Then there are Social Security cards. You can check Social Security numbers, but all they'll tell you (and as an employer, I know), is that the number is legitimate and the name matches the number. Again, pretty easy to fake that. How can I tell if it's legit or not? Go "with my gut"? Do I risk turning down an applicant because I "think" they're illegal? Because they speak Spanish?

I suppose we could fingerprint anyone that applies. Is that the answer? But who do you send it to? The police only know people who have been fingerprinted in the past. An illegal could very easily not show up there. Does INS accept requests for fingerprint checks? How much are they? How long does it take?

I don't have a million dollars, so I need to know how this works.

[sabbat hunter]

9. couple of things

1) not all illegal immigrants speak spanish. some come from China, african nations, other asian nations.
2) a national database of some sort to check out the SS#s, and multiple forms of ID (2 or more one must be a picture ID (ie state ID or drivers license etc which is what is required now) in the database you will be able to make sure there arent 2 people with the same SS# or that the person associated with the # is dead, living across the country, etc.

[ProudDad]

12. And many come from those nasty 3rd world countries

like Ireland, England, Spain, Canada...

[donco6]

19. Okay.

As soon as that database gets set up, let me know.

[Igel]

15. And that's the problem with #1.

You can't tell if the thing presented as a Arizona driver's license is valid (esp. when you live in Oregon and the applicant's saying he just moved); I have no idea what SS cards for the last 35 years look like (no, that's wrong; I saw one maybe 20 years ago and thought for sure it was fake ... it wasn't).

Moreover, the SSA doesn't always tell you if the name matches the number (at least in 1996 they didn't). Note that the SSA is forbidden from telling ICE about mismatches, or even invalid SSNs.

What's worse is if you suspect somebody's ID isn't valid and you do more intensive background checks, you'd better hope like hell that no pattern emerges: That most of the people you're checking aren't Latinos or Asians, or even "foreigners"--nothing like having the government nail you for discrimination.

[napi21]

18. What about demanding a birth certificate along with a picture ID

and a SS#? I was 56 years old when I moved from Pa. to Ga. I was born in PA, and worked since I was 16. When I applied for a Ga. DL, I presented my original SS card, the birth certificate that was issued when I was born, and a Ga. utility bill to demonstrate my new address. Well, the GA. DMV wasn't happy with my birth certificate because it didn't have a "State Seal" on it. I had to order a new one from Pa. as the only proof they would accept. I don't want to say it's impossible to have forged all three documents, but it would be a whole lot more difficult!

If your birth certificate is from another country, other documents could be presented to prove your status.

[donco6]

20. Sorry, but what good does a birth certif do?

If they can fake a green card, they can fake one of these. I think it would be even easier.

[sabbat hunter]

27. a green card can be verified

by the government. i dont know why we dont do that now.

[donco6]

45. But if they're not claiming to be an immigrant . . .

I wouldn't get a green card to check.

[Greyhound]

26. I just signed up with an agency that required me to produce my birth certificate. Not a copy,

but the actual, state sealed document. A passport would also be acceptable and too few of us have them anyway. So it appears that if you really want to ensure that you are hiring legal residents and citizens it is possible.

[DBoon]

13. I wouldn't regulate the immigrant

I'd regulate the employer.

I'd make anyone wanting to hire immigrants apply for a license.

They would have to pay a special tax to cover the additional public services that may be required (public schools, medical, etc.)

The would have to pay prevailing wages and benefits else the license would be revoked.

[Czolgosz]

21. Have them cut our lawns, make our hotel beds, and drive down wages - isn't that what we do?

[Donald Ian Rankin]

28. Liberalise immigration laws, give them a chance to apply again, and deport the remainder.

There are a great many people who are trying to immigrate to America legally and being turned down, not because of their own merits but simply because of numbers.

I would have severe issues with any solution that benefited someone who had immmigrated illegaly over such people.

The solution I would propose would be to make immigration significantly easier, to offer an amnesty period during which people present in the US illegally could apply to "immigrate" legally, on equal terms with all others, admit those who aren't disqualified for some reason, and deport the remainder.

[Warren Stupidity]

31. "make immigration significantly easier"?

such that all of those people in what used to be northern mexico who are here doing relatively low skill jobs would qualify for immmigrant status?

And when they don't qualify then move millions of people out of what used to be northern mexico until we stole it from them? And their citizen-children, what do we do with them?

[liberal renegade]

30. who has had their livelyhood affected by an illegal immigrant?

theres plenty of work for anybody who wants to work. The problem with wages is nobody fucking sticks together anymore, it's dog eat dog, quit blaming the mexicans.......


RASCISM, PREJUDICE, BIGOTRY, CORPORATE GREED AND CORRUPT POLITICIANS ARE BIGGER PROBLEMS THAN ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION......

[unlawflcombatnt]

49. No, there are NOT plenty of jobs for everyone.

There are 231 million working age Americans and only 146 million Americans are working. There is no shortage of workers for any job in the United States. There's only a shortage of employers willing to pay enough to hire Americans.

[illinoisprogressive]

35. well, most wingers want to round them up like stray cattle.

[leftyladyfrommo]

44. I think we should invite them all over for beer.

That always works well for me.

I'll probably get blasted all the way to China for this - but I really like the illegals I know. I want them to stay in my neighborhood.

[Cleita]

50. Where do they get those figures?

It's not like anyone is going to admit to a census taker that they are illegal. So are they counting everyone who looks Mexican, who could be legal as well as illegal? Inquiring minds need to know.