Welfare to kids of illegals in LA County costs $276 million per year

[busterb]

Does anyone who has posted in this BS think that what they say, think want, will have any inpact of what the powers that be sell out for? If so someone is living in a fools world!

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by busterb

Does anyone who has posted in this BS think that what they say, think want, will have any inpact of what the powers that be sell out for? If so someone is living in a fools world!

In aggregate, what the people want is already having an impact. But having elected representatives is a lot like herding cats...they don't always go the way you want.

We'll see what happens.

[xoxoxoBruce]

You can't herd cats. just kill 'em and get a new one that's where you want it to be. Same for politicians.

Originally Posted by MaggieL

To keep flies away, it's more important and easier to cover the food than to mend the holes in the screen.

Its most important of all to ask "Who benefits?" Someone is benefiting from leaving all that food out for the flies. Check your premises, Maggie. Who is leaving the food out and why?

The businessmen who hire the illegals are the ones who benefit from this entire mess. The people who work for "la migra" also benefit, although to a far lesser degree. Let's say I have a 1,000 acre grape farm or, better yet, a chain of hotels/motels that uses illegal labor at a far lesser cost than what it would be to hire bona fide US citizens.

When's the last time you heard of of a group of Hilton executives (or whatever big hotel chain) being arrested for using illegals as employees? I go into the Walmart in Montrose, Colorado. You'd think I was in Mexico City. Those folks are buying stuff to support the Chinese economy just like good American citizens do. They pay sales tax on their purchases which goes to help underpin the staggering toward collapse any second now, Montrose County, Colorado economy.

Who contributes to the war chests of congress-persons in states where their is a high number of illegals? Don't all raise your hands at once. HINT: It is the AMERICAN (ie US) businessman.

US law currently states that any child born within this country's borders is automatically a citizen. Now, you can lobby DC to change this law or else you can make the decision to turn your "flies" into "bees." Give those kids the medical care, food, and education to make them productive citizens of this country.

We are willing to spend trillions on killing people in the Far East, yet dig in our heels at making an investment of millions here at home. The US needs to let go of its xenophobic attitude toward the world. We either kill foreigners outright or exploit them as a source of cheap labor. Check your premises. Who benefits from this stance?

Over to you, Ms. Rand.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by marichiko

Its most important of all to ask "Who benefits?" Someone is benefiting from leaving all that food out for the flies. Check your premises, Maggie. Who is leaving the food out and why?
Over to you, Ms. Rand.

You're kinda late to this party. Go back and read all of this thread and the other immigration ones. I think punishing the criminals who are exploiting the illegals is more important than any futile attempt to seal the border...and I've said so several times.

That's the "cover the food"...no point in trying to deport millions of illegals who will just turn around and head back across the border. Remove their motivation for being here by making it unprofitable to exploit them; it's easier.

Also read what I've written about the 14th amendment...as far as I'm concerened, illegals aren't "under the jurisdiction of the United States" until they're apprehended.

You'll have to excuse me. Between being banned for a while and moving 400 miles across the state of brain death, I haven't been able to keep up with the recent doings of the board.

I am honestly curious as to how a follower of Ms. Rand's philosophy would view the current "illegal situation" in the US. Ms. Rand herself was an immigrant - a fortunate one in that she was a Russian opposed to the then current soviet regime and had the benefit of an education.

She viewed most government as an impediment - "Get the hell out of my way!" It seems to me that the group that would fall into her definition of "parasites" in this instance is the US businessman who hires the migrants illegally and pays no social security, workman's comp, etc that he would he have to pay for a US worker. The illegals don't just walk across the border and immediantly apply for welfare. They WORK at substandard wages, doing jobs that US workers refuse to do.

So why all the ill will toward them?

[Ibby]

But she also thought that hands-off (I can't spell the french word) capitalism was the only viable government, and the illegal immigrant worker situation is about economics more than anything else, and so she would support the use of illegal immigrant workers as a perfectly fine way to compete in business.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by marichiko

You'll have to excuse me. Between being banned for a while and moving 400 miles across the state of brain death, I haven't been able to keep up with the recent doings of the board.

Yes, you were so anxious to dash in here and pick a fight that it wasn't necessary to find out what I'd actually said first. :-) And you've already forgotten what I've actually said about Rand, too.

Originally Posted by marichiko

They WORK at substandard wages, doing jobs that US workers refuse to do.

Because legal workers believe the jobs are worth more. "Jobs legal workers won't do" is a slogan that conveniently bundles low-skill or physical jobs with the wages that those exploitive employers--remeber them? feel like paying. The fact that conditions are so much worse in Mexico doesn't make the illegals heros for sneaking in here and exporting as much cash as possible. I guess I'm just not a pure enough Randite to beleive that the borders should be opened while we're still running as Socialist a state as we do.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by Ibram

... and so she would support the use of illegal immigrant workers as a perfectly fine way to compete in business.

There's nobody more anxious to put words in Rand's mouth now that she's dead than a liberal...and Mari does it more than anybody else; you're competing with a pro now, Ibram. :-) I can hardly wait to see the Tom Cruise/Angelina Jolie version of "Atlas Shrugged"; that should be a real hoot too.

A dead author makes such a great factory for straw men; you can make them say anything you want. Myself, I don't think "a perfectly fine way to compete in business" includes competing in a labor market with someone who doesn't have to follow the same laws you do.

[Ibby]

Hey, I'm not TRYING to put words in her mouth, if thats what I was doing, I was just hypothesising. I'm not a big fan of her philosophy anyway, though shes a damn good writer. Anthem kicks ass, and not just because it's the foundation for 2112. But I digress. I was merely stating what I figured would be her view on the issue, though I know no better than anyone else. If I failed to clarify that as a hypothesis, my apologies.

Originally Posted by MaggieL

There's nobody more anxious to put words in Rand's mouth now that she's dead than a liberal...and Mari does it more than anybody else; you're competing with a pro now, Ibram. :-) I can hardly wait to see the Tom Cruise/Angelina Jolie version of "Atlas Shrugged"; that should be a real hoot too.

Did you ever see that old version of The Fountainhead with Gary Cooper ? Gawd, that was awful!

A dead author makes such a great factory for straw men; you can make them say anything you want. Myself, I don't think "a perfectly fine way to compete in business" includes competing in a labor market with someone who doesn't have to follow the same laws you do.

Oh, you're just PO'ed that a liberal has made an intense study of Ms. Rand. I agree with you that we all need to follow the same laws. The businessmen who knowingly hire illegals should face the legal consequences of their actions. This seldom seems to happen.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by marichiko

The businessmen who knowingly hire illegals should face the legal consequences of their actions. This seldom seems to happen.

Totally agree. But that is going to require making it easy for an employer to positively identify who is elegible to work in the US and who isn't...and right now that's a joke. How you do that without a national identity document I don't know. I'm not opposed to that, since I'm already identity-documented up the wazoo, but I know a lot of other people are for reasons they're seldom able to articulate; they just begin FUDding around about Big Brother without explaining what freedom of anonymity it is they have now that they're going to lose if the big scary goverment can actually figure out who they are.

Well, I don't like the idea of national idenity papers, myself, but in effect, we already have them. They're our social security cards and driver's licences. Documents can always be forged, anyway. What ticks me off is the outfits who knowingly hire illegals who don't even have a FORGED green card. If employers would start saying "no tickee, no job", the problem would begin to resolve itself right there.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by marichiko

Documents can always be forged, anyway.

True...but a good document system would be extremely difficult to forge.

Make green cards really hard to forge. Post big signs at the border in Spanish, "Don't leave home without it," then crack down hard on employers who hire workers who did.

Actually, I don't see what good idenity papers are, anyhow, with the current disregard for who has valid ones or not.

I had a boyfriend once who took his driver's licence and inserted a picture of an otter where his face should have been because he wanted to "look like I ottah" (I know, I sure can pick 'em). Anyway I was with him once when he got pulled over by a cop to be issued a warning for not coming to a complete stop at a stop sign. My boyfriend handed his licence to the cop and the guy didn't even blink. Just said "Make sure you come to a complete stop next time," and handed him his licence back.

Come to think of it, he DID sort of look like the otter on his licence - big brown eyes and blond whiskers.