As the leaders of Mexico - US & Canada meet in Cancun this week to strengthen their relations & sort out their differences, it is clear that the thorniest issue is not softwood lumber, but the issue of over 12 millions illegals or undocumented workers in America. In the main, those workers are Mexicans. Without them the US-economy would falter.\nBush's guest worker program that offers millions a chance to trade in uncertainty for citizenship which also offers most a bit of dignity. Many Americans are more hesitant, fearful of the consequences. Most Republicans in Congress, seized with a xenophopic cultural chauvinism, are following up on the successful revolt over the Dubai Port World deal with an equally racist position on illegal immigration. Instead of recognizing the invaluaable contribution these ppl. have made, tahe focus is on how much they cost. As if they aren't ppl. but a commodity. As if we could
127425
To answer this question you have to look deeper at the issues. First, the US has outpaced the world in labor costs. Americans want more for less and are given it. That is why companies move their factories overseas, the labor there is so cheap it's still cost effective even after paying shipping costs for their goods. The Global Economy will eventually reverse this but Americans won't be happy about it.\n\nSecondly, legalizing the illegals will only make companies that use them pay them minimum wage, hence no longer cheap labor. Their whole appeal to companies is that they don't have to pay them American wages, no health care, etc, so legalizing them doesn't solve anything, those companies will just go get more.\n\nYou want to make the economy work, drop the minimum wage, which artificially alters the free market, and let people work for what they will. So long as companies pass the saving on to the consumer, you will see a downward spiral in pay but also in cost of goods.\n\nUnfortunately, there will always be rich people, middle people, and poor people. Even socialism does that. Look at the Soviet Union, and even now, Cuba. There are haves and have nots. It's human nature, we are not hive animals or insects.
323532
The President wants to close the borders. This has international and domestic impacts.  Internationally, Mexico is our next door neighbor and a huge source of its funding comes from the funds sent home by immigrants to the United States.  Both the Presidential candidates in Mexico are running on platforms regarding OUR immigration policies.  We like friendly relations with our neighbors. \n\nDomestically, employers want to have access to lower wage workers.  Closing the borders will limit their access to those workers.  Their opposition would make it harder for Bush to address the issue.\n\nDomestically also, there is a huge illegal immigrant population which has never been screened for diseases we have eradicated here, as legal immigrants are screened. Probably more importantly from Bush's point of view, that huge group could easily hide a multitude of terrorists, since they have never been screened for that, either.\n\nSo in building a coalition to address this issue, Bush came up with a guest worker program.  As an incentive to screening the illegal immigrants already here, and for the more human reasons a number of people have already raised on these pages, he came up with a path to citizenship within that program.  That would also bring them within society so that the hard case undesirables wouldn't be shielded by Hispanics who would normally have nothing to do with them.\n\nHe is defending the country as he sees it.\n\nWhat do I think of his approach?  I could design a program with all of those elements that I could live with. Part of it would be to make sure the employers funded the social services needed to support their work force. That would also make their wages more on par with those of our own workers which would help even the playing field. Another part of my plan would be to make the whole thing conditional on a truly secure border. Unfortunately, Bush hasn't asked me to write up the program.
223762
they take them for granted ... the problems are that the US, whether like it or not, permitted, whether explicitly or implicitly, illegal immigrants to be a part of the society.  \nI mean look at those labor forces in south ...   amigos in the service sectors .... If we kicked them out of the country, we would not only have a major shortage of labor, but also a major loss of tax revenue for offsetting the aging baby-boomer population.  By the way the last point would be crucial for the US to remain healthy compared to the rest of industrialized nations.
286753
The question you posed is a VERY serious one. I feel strongly that they are in cahoots with the Mexican Government with the intent of turning at least part of the U.S. over to Mexico... they are using illegals, over 20 million at this time.. to ruin the economy and force serious concessions with Mexico.
602806
secure the borders (both) then begin a systematic deportation process in tandem with strict fines and possible revocation of business licenses for employers who are not properly validating perspective employee work status.\n\nI am in line with 77% of Americans who support the house on enforcement. Just as before...Amnesty will not work. It has been tried and it is in part responsible for the national domestic crisis that America is facing now.\n\nMexico is NOT doing enough. They are actually encouraging this behavior in a big way. The Mexican government seems in way over their heads. I do not believe there is any thing the Mexican government can do to clean up the corruption that has brought that country to it's knees short of bringing in the U.N.  I am surprised that the people of Mexico have yet to organize a labor strike in their own country.
186099
Yea (To The ASKER) I Hate IGNORANCE Too\n\nThis Part Of My Answer Goes Out To BRAD_J(Above)\n\nthere are jobs Americans simply won't do, so that the importation of foreigners is essential. Whether these foreign workers are ILLEGAL ALIENS,  guestworkers, or permanent Legal Immigrants is a detail to be worked out by us, the argument goes, but our need for them is unchanged.Even many opponents of the proposed Bush Amnesty assume this to be true, leading them to propose new and improved guestworker programs, with provisions for stricter controls against Permanent Settlement, greater incentives to return, tighter enforcement against Unscrupulous Employers, etc. As well-meaning as such efforts may be, the basic assumption is false — \n\nIf Congress were to pass a law that said, quite simply, that the CEO of any business that was caught employing ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS went to jail for a year - NO EXCEPTIONS - then within a month there would be ten million (more or less) people lined up at the Mexican border trying to get out of the United States. The US unemployment rate would drop close to zero, and wages would begin to rise. The American middle class would begin to return to viability, as would the union movement in this nation.\n\nThere is simply no economic reason to import FOREIGN Workers.If the supply of FOREIGN Workers were to dry up (say, through actually ENFORCING the immigration law, for starters), employers would respond to this new, tighter, labor market in two ways. \n\n1: One, they would offer HIGHER Wages, INCREASED Benefits, and Improved Working Conditions, so as to recruit and retain people from the remaining pool of workers.\n\n2:At the same time, the same employers would look for ways to eliminate some of the jobs they now are having trouble filling. The result would be a NEW Equilibrium, with Blue-Collar Workers making somewhat Better Money, but each one of those workers being more productive.\n\nMany people fear the first part of such a response, claiming that prices for fruits and vegetables would skyrocket, fueling inflation..NOT TRUE..Labor accounts for only about ten percent of the retail price of a head of lettuce,  so even doubling the wages of pickers would have little noticeable effect on consumers.\n\nSeveral people told me they used to do the "jobs Americans won't do" until local employers figured out they could get ILLEGAL Aliens to work for less than half the same amount. As an example, a young landscaper who used to make $15 an hour 10 years ago, can't get a similar job now for more than $8 an hour. Same heat. Same difficult working conditions.  But with the Depressed Wage, AMERICANS – who live in a country where the cost of living is miles above that of Mexico's – can't afford to take such jobs.It's not that he and other Americans don't want to do landscaping anymore; it's just that in heavily trafficked ILLEGAL Alien environments, IT DOESNT PAY WELL ENOUGH ANYMORE.\n\n Younger U.S.-born high school graduates are squeezed at both ends. Jobs that would have gone to them in the past are now being grabbed by college graduates. The lowest-wage jobs are unappealing, and employers will not raise wages as long as ILLEGAL Immigrants will take them.\n\nIf this is what the open borders crowd means by ILLEGAL ALIENS doing jobs Americans don't want, they're right. American workers want jobs that can Earn them a DECENT LIVING in this country. Minimum wage is a fortune south of the border, but it doesn't go far here. \n***************************\n\nBack To The ASKERS Question---\n\n\nLets Get The Numbers Straight AND Ill Throw In A Few OTHER Facts For You TOO(For All You Bush Crime Family Lovers)\n\nThe BUSH Crime Family Administration Couldn't Have Done A Better Job \nOf Turning Iraq Into America's Most Expensive And  Dangerous Enemy If It Had Genuinely Had That As Its Goal. . . .\n\n\nAmount appropriated by the US Congress for Opereations In Iraq
220306
I agree with you... it seems like the media likes to turn it into something more controversial than it already is.  You are right, we are not targeting Mexicans... we are targeting all ILLEGAL immigrants.  I don't get it.  Now, the Senate has reopened a bill that will allow this "guest worker program" that will grant all illegal immigrants citizenship.  It's a slap in the face for those who seek citizenship LEGALLY and had to wait in line.  \n\nCALL or email your congressman... or even the White House.  Looks like they want to pass this bill by Memorial Day.  What a tragedy for America.  This is going to lead to more illegal people coming over and eventually DEMANDING citizenship - why make laws if they are not enforced particularly ones that are meant to keep us safe?  We might as well make it a free for all and open our doors to anyone, regardless of who they are or what they have done.  I mean that is what we are doing now...
629398
That the Congress is now wanting to give amnesty to all these people. I think there is a hidden agenda there and I think it will undermine the present midleclass. I live in AZ and see the jobs construction jobs these persons are taking that most of us couldn't live on. Now there is a push for minority small business owners, painters, stucco, roofing etc looking for bilingual persons to run crews of these people putting many of us oit of work.
515423
Absolutely. It is in my opinion the number one danger to our country. It's not just the illegals coming here looking for work, that is a problem that directly affects the middle and lower class Americans. It also is killing many states budgets. The real problem is how many people with ill will are coming across our borders, especially the southern border? I keep reading on here about the next attack. Does anyone not believe if we do nothing about our border and port security it will only be a matter of time until the next one? Both political parties are guilty, they look at this issue as offending prospective future voters. What about  Americans? Are we just the fools who pay the taxes and get shafted so illegals can get services many of us can't, and business owners get cheap labor? Write your elected officials after January.
280569
I say 'to hell with Mexico'. The United States spends billions annually, subsidizing mexican citizens for this, that, and the other, I think our country even sends money directly to theirs to prop it up. Mexico's answer? More people swarming north with an entitlement mentality. \nWell mexico/mexicans, guess what? Americans, the people that live on the land you lost during the war and signed away on the treaty of guadalupe-hidalgo in 1848, long before any of us were born, are tired of the crime, the social problems, and the attitude. If you're going to move to america, lose the mexican flag and se hablo englais. Not because we hate you, or because we hate mexico, but because this is the here-and-now. I will never employ a mexican illegal, period, end of story. When I go to the store, if I can't get a clerk that can do stuff and help people en englais, and/or has the big attitude about it, that's a manager's complaint. I support fining holy hell out of employers that knowingly hire illegals, if they want to hire mexican citizens they can vote with their feet and take their businesses TO mexico.  \n\nWhat I think is funny is that more and more republicans are finally seeing bush and company for what they are, a bunch of total sellouts. \n\nlegal immigration works for america, what they've done with the mexico issue is set the country up for a train wreck, eventually...
583774
They are not in this for the illegal immigrants.  They are in this for the going forward guest worker program that would bring in an additional 60 million poor workers over the next 20 years - about a third of the population of the United States. http://www.heritage.org/Research/Immigration/wm1109.cfm\n\nThis will drive down wages, while taxpayers pay the 'benefits' of Big Business's work force.  It is not being a Democrat, it is the 'Big Business' face of the Republican party.  They are now trying to buy off Republican voters with insane proposed Constitutional Amendments that everyone knows don't have enough votes to pass.  I for one feel that adds insult to injury (and further insult when you realize that I for one would be opposed to the amendments, in any event.)\n\nThey have a backbone made of PAC committees and Corporate Donors.  However, there just isn't enough Big Business vote to elect a Senator.  Poor things.\n\nOh, and about McCain, he canceled a speaker position for Bilbray, the Republican running for the San Diego House seat because Bilbray's opponent sent McCain a letter pointing out that Bilbray had cut down her own support for McCain's bill.  Bilbray had to cancel the event.  His polls have gone up. Of course this may also have something to do with his opponent being taped telling an illegal alien he could still work for her 'and vote' for her.  We vote tomorrow.  Should be interesting.
175201
Well, I think it could go both ways.  They are actually not too bad for the United States, contrary to popular belief.  They are one of the minority groups that are the hardest working and least compensated.  \n\nIn my opinion, those that actually make the attempt to reach the US are those that are searching for a better life and are willing to work hard to achieve it.  In that case, it is negative for Mexico, because they are losing potentially good citizens.  (Contrary to your provided article.)\n\nSeems like we just need to come up with more accessible ways of getting here legally...
116104
I believe that Bush wants to offer blanket amnesty to all illegal aliens in the United States, as long as they submit to background checks and make their presence known in the country.  He calls this his "guest worker" policy, much like they have in Europe.  Foreign immigrants, he says, will fill the jobs that no one else will take.  Although this sounds racist and perhaps elitist, it is common practice in every part of the world, including Europe and Asia.  He doesn't want to kick anyone out, as I understand it.  It is one of the few Bush policies that I agree with.
602642
Pretty much, and his followers in Congress are well on their way to being out on their asses, and good riddance. They need two things prominently on display in Washington, one of em is a MAP, the other is the Constitution. You could go ahead and tack up some copies of the Declaration of Independence while you're at it, and to hell with CAFTA. Now that college students have figured out how to run a car on bullshit(I'm not kidding), Washington now independently generates all the energy we'll ever need! LOL \n\nMexico's a hole, and walling it off til they get their act together someday is a superlative idea. Call it 'protectionism', well let's see some MORE protectionism, there. \n\nI think more people are taking the time to review all this stuff\nwith clear heads, these days, with an eye to preventing the onset of socialism. Nothing cures socialism like a boot squarely in the ASS.\n\nNAFTA? Put THAT one in the shredder, please...'we got your NAFTA right HERE!' LOL\n\nI think immigration reform will be tough, but as more people tune into the idea, and realize that we've been really really liberal on tht issue for too long(ironically moreso under this 'republican' administration), and that it's time to pull the plug on it. Mexico, and other 2nd/3rd world(whatever) countries need to work on their own reforms and get their respective acts together, and stop expecting america to constantly bail them out, or play host to their citizens. There's 6.5 billion people in the world, 300 million live in america, others can solve their own problems, for a change. While we're at it, stop giving the UN billions, too. They can leech off someone else, for a change...
288055
It doesn't surprise me.  The public discussion is so corrupted by silly partisanship that the truth about immigration is hard to find.  BTW, my wife is from Mexico and she is against illegal immigration.  Larry Kudlow has written a column that does the best job of getting it right so far.
181591
somebody said about no real jobs and the mexicans issue. This anyway doesnt apply on me I am not mexican, but why I cant find a decent Job. I have my education and i am sure not because of the mexicans but because of the OUTSOURCING. My Job aswell of many other vanished for some CHEAP LABOR overseas (india and china), The issue of the illegal immigrant has been  a problem since forever, but why now it was erupted? Because the Big companies are laying off people left and right, and outsourcing the jobs of others, maybe they knew some retaliation will happen so they erupt and paid money in millions to let media concentrate on mexicans.\n\nBeside that someone said the 300.000 on welfare.... Did you trach how many are not mexicans on welfare and they are capable of working but they dont want to do anything beside selling crack on the streets and hang out arround. You know how many are those? MANYYYY.\n\nWhat about the war thats is not OURS!!! war expense everyday was estimated of 100 millions. Gaz for vehicles, food for soldiers, etc... What we have to do with irakians problems? why we still there? thats beside everyday we lose one or 2 soldiers. These are humans !!! THATS where you lose Money!!!\n\nAnd for those who said now we have laws about immigration I am afraid that you missed totally the point of the person who asked this question. He mentioned the settlers as a prove that all white, yellow, black, brown except what called red indians are IMMIGRANT. You accept that fact or not, this country history return back to 300 to 400 years max. \n\nAnyway americans are offensive to newly immigrant? yes but because of some rules in some companies about zero tolerance against discrimination they dont say it out loud. btw If the americans didnt descriminate against others based on their origin...why there is a law prohibit the descrimination !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
270803
I'm not sure I'm reading your question properly:  Would refusing to hire illegals make Mexico better and be better for illegals?  \n\nTo be honest, I think the particular illegal must think his or her immediate future is better here and working.  However, as social policy, so long as we are a pressure valve for Mexico's poor and criminal (gee, thanks on that last, too) they have no need to reform.\n\nI did notice that Kennedy tried to put into the Senate Bill something about OSHA regulations having to be followed for the guest workers, too, and IT WAS VOTED DOWN!  I am not sure what that is supposed to mean.  Guest worker eyes, fingers and toes aren't important to protect?  Aliens thrive on lead based paint dust? \n\nI'm beginning to think we should go with clean border security now, then take a long hard look at how we want to handle the rest.