Immigration Simplified
A take on immigration from OWB. Cross posted from elsewhere.
–
The current problem that we face is complicated. No doubt about that fact. Illegal entry into this country has been ignored, obfuscated, and purposefully been made into the situation we now see.
There are two main issues which we can address immediately that will help us sort through the confusion and chaos. We can and must stop adding to the problem and concurrently remove the incentives which contribute to the problem.
Just as we lock our household doors, not to keep out our friends, but to make access more difficult for whatever bad guy out there might or might not try to enter our home for unfriendly reasons, a sovereign nation has not only the right but the obligation to provide the same for the country. Our front doors are substantially made with heavy locks to control who gets into our homes. Why should our borders and other ports of entry be different from our homes?
Lefties tend to repeat the mantra that our borders should be open. Perhaps in some ways that is true. But, they should only be as open as we are willing to maintain our homes. If I leave my front door open and people I don’t know take up residence in my living room am I really obligated to invite them to dinner? How many rooms should I add to my home to accommodate the strangers now living in my home? By securing the perimeter I can avoid having to deal with any of this.
But what about those folks already living in my home? How do we get rid of them? One thing the lefties do get right is saying that deporting the multiple millions of illegal aliens would be expensive and nearly impossible to accomplish. Can we somehow get them to remove themselves?
Eliminating the rewards that people receive when coming here illegally will cause some of them to self-deport. Perhaps many will do so. Maybe even most would. We do not know how many will leave on their own, but we know that at least some would prefer to be at home with their families than in a foreign country with no rewards for remaining. However many that is, it reduces the number of illegal aliens with which we must deal later. Every one that self-deports us saves us money immediately.
None of us can say exactly what is needed much less how much it will cost to solve the illegal immigration problem. Anything we can do to make it a smaller problem should be a priority. But first we need to keep it from becoming worse. Better yet, reduce the scope of the problem as we are developing ways to get rid of it altogether. Too many people have been killed by illegal aliens. Too many illegal aliens are being paid with our tax dollars for things they have not earned. It is past time to lock down the revolving door.
No, I don’t care who they are, where they came from, or with whom they associate. Until we control entry into this country we have no national security. Since that is one of the few legitimate functions of our national government, it would be nice if they did their job.
The dirty secret in the middle of all this is the drug trade. It will never be seriously addressed until our national security is taken seriously. Drugs have weakened our ability to defend ourselves individually and collectively. They are perhaps nearly completely responsible for the lawlessness we see on streets and country roads across the country. It is a national disgrace, one which could be corrected if we had the will to do so. But it will never be fixed with porous borders and other ports of entry.
The time for hand wringing is long past. Many around the nation have finally awakened to the reality of this and other problems too long ignored as is evidenced by the election of a political neophyte as our president. With the pace of his work this week toward fulfilling his campaign promises, it would appear that President Trump will come closer to solving this and other serious issues than has anyone of the political chattering class. We can only hope that he succeeds. With our help, he just might do it.
Category: Geezer Alert!
I am sorry that good people die in war. I am sorry that children get very ill and face tragedies. I am sorry that some innocent people are wrongly convicted of crimes they did not commit. In short, I’m sorry about a great many things that happen to a good many people in this world. What I am not the least bit sorry about is disrupting would-be immigrants’ plans to come here until the mess is sorted out, and I am not at all sorry that people who sneaked across our border and avail themselves of all sorts of goodies here will be, I trust, expelled. The sob stories are already being pushed out. Tough shit.
I still don’t understand why anyone would think it’s fine to not make people go through the same process that other immigrants have faced, e.g., real screening. The world has changed enormously since Ellie Island was closed. To not recognize that is foolishness.
Apparently, letting the secret ‘Slamonazi’s come here to slaughter us is OK with the Proglodytes as long as we don’t slow or impede any “refugee” mooselimbs who want to immigrate. The proggies seem to have forgotten about San Bernardino. Oh well, that was just a little workplace violence.
But..but…but…
We dont understand them! We dont understand their lack of opportunity! We support the wrong side in the mideast! Its our fault. They are misunderstood. We are raaaaaaaacisssst!
Sometimes, they sound exactly like the badly beaten and broken woman in the ER, who keeps saying
Its all my fault. He really loves me.
There are many immigrants who came here legally that are vehemently opposed to any concessions for illegal aliens and I stand with them. IMHO we owe illegal aliens nothing other than deportation if they don’t want to leave on their own!
AS invaders, we owe them nothing more than a 30-06 round right in the forehead! imho
I’m all for ‘securing’ the border, and I agree with a lot of what you say here. For me, though, the big three questions are how we do, at what cost, and what does it accomplish?
I’m -pardon the pun- on the fence about the wall itself. Walls alone rarely stop determined people. They’ll find spots to climb and cross, or tunnel underneath, and the cartels have access to boats and our northern border -also not very secure- and will certainly still find ways in. Some of this can be addressed with tech – motion sensors, drones, ground-penetrating radar, etc – but all of this increases cost. If the government says $12B-$15B, I’m inclined to double it – they don’t exactly have a great track record of coming in on budget for projects. Maybe that’s still worth it, or maybe there are better ways to spend that money – like increased CBP personnel and coverage.
And ultimately, we’re still left with the fact that when it comes to security, securing the Southern border helps in the same way that locking your front door while leaving your windows open, your back door unlocked and a key for the front door under a nearby rock. It’s something, sure, but it’s not going to stop anyone with proper motivation. Most illegal immigrants are people who’ve overstayed visas, I believe, and the wall won’t help with that. Our ports are a whole other issue, too.
I’m all ears for opposing points of view on this; I want a more secure border. I’m just not convinced this is going to be very effective. The principle of a secure border is fantastic; the reality .. well, it depends on cost and effectiveness.
The wall isn’t a be all-end all solution. It’s just 1 tool in CBP’s toolbox. Most of America has no clue just how much wall is already in place. Around 220 miles in the Tucson sector alone. There are places where a wall can’t be used, for environmental and topological reasons. It DOES work, no wall stops everything. Not even the Berlin Wall, and it was designed to keep people in.
There is no single thing which will magically fix everything.
If you or I were in an accident which both broke a leg and punctured a lung, just because treating the lung would do nothing to fix the leg is no excuse to ignore the lung. That seems to be the way our national security issues have been addressed for too long. Just because a wall would not keep speedboats from landing in Miami is no justification for not building a wall which would keep out others.
There are many things which can be done by bureaucrats already on the payroll to stem the flow and reduce the incentives for the casual border crosser from doing so illegally. Of course the hard core criminals will continue to do whatever it is that they are already doing. But, by encouraging however many would do so to leave on their own, the numbers left are smaller.
If the easy money reasons are reduced and eliminated, fewer will be coming across walls, fences, open land, and by other means. Of course all these all need to be addressed.
Every dollar we currently spend on unearned benefits to non citizens could more sensibly be sent on security.
Yes there is. End the welfare system. Entirely.
Illegal immigration is only an important issue because of welfare systems. End those, end the problem with it.
Once everyone has to work to be here, immigration as a whole fixes itself.
BTW, this might created an outflow of parasitic populations as well. A true win-win.
Again, no major disagreement conceptually, it’s just the implementation – it’s like saying “We need CAS for our troops… so let’s build the F-35 to do it!”. A lot of people argue that the money we’re going to spend on that -and we’re going to spend some money, it’s just a question of where- would be better directed towards the A-10 platform.
And, for me, it comes down to effectiveness. I honestly don’t know how effective a wall will be, and I think a lot of that depends on what else we do besides a wall. If you tell me the wall will be 100% effective, spending $15B is worth it. If you tell me it’ll be 1% effective, then it isn’t. Somewhere in between those extremes is where it’ll likely end up, and that determines its value to me.
In other words, I’m for reducing illegal immigration, but not convinced the wall is the best way to go about it.
For me we as a nation haven’t been serious about enforcing the labor laws with respect to immigration. The laws not being prosecuted put the lie to the government’s words about securing the border. Where do all these illegals work? Who hires them? How are they getting a job? When I hire someone these days I have to fill out the Homeland Security forms and make copies of the required forms of identification. How does an illegal have a US Passport or other legal identification from the United States? When a company is found to be employing illegal aliens why isn’t the CEO and the head of human resources jailed for the full length that the law allows? If you knew you’d be spending the next 15 years in an 8×10 because you wanted to save a few bucks an hour by hiring some illegal you’d be a lot less likely to hire them. Especially after you’d seen a few of your competitors very publicly locked up after being perp walked out of the company’s head office. We aren’t anymore serious about illegals than we are about the drug war. In the drug war we concentrate on the junkies because it’s easier….if we drone strike the home of the head of the cartels and execute them along with their wives and children we send a far different message than locking up some stupid junkie jus trying to escape their childhood trauma by self medicating with a controlled substance instead of alcohol. We are great at talking a lot about what we believe as a country, we’re not nearly as good about following up with serious action to put some teeth into our words. Our war on drugs is a fucking joke, and our war on illegal immigration has been a fucking joke as well. A wall by itself is also nothing more than a giant, expensive monument to stupidity and bullshit unless there are teeth in the immigration laws to punish those who profit. If you make the cost of business too expensive for the profiteers they move onto to… Read more »
When a company is found to be employing illegal aliens why isn’t the CEO and the head of human resources jailed for the full length that the law allows?
Just to be clear, people should be held accountable for knowingly hiring someone here illegally. There should be no penalty for hiring someone who collects the documentation, presents it to the DHS for verification and is told “the hire is good” only to find later that the hire is not here legally.
While it seems like a minor point, I am leery of holding people accountable for following the law and getting bad information back. It happens more than people realize.
Walls, like any other obstacle, won’t stop anyone by themselves. They are only meant to slow down and require more effort from those who wish to cross them. They buy time for police to get to the scene and apprehend or deter those wishing to cross the obstacle.
Do what you believe is right, what you feel is right, and in the end it will all work out. There wont be any negative consequences, and if there are they will be worked out correctly, because we did what we felt was right, and if it fails we still did what was right.
You can dig a very deep and very deadly hole with that sort of thinking.
We are dealing with a hostile and “conquistador” culture that lives and breathes “dominance and submission” games as a way of life. Showing wweakeness and/or passivity is -not- a winning strategy, not will it hasten a negotiation of disputes, not drive a transformation of behavior.
It is sheer folly and highly bigoted to assume that all other humans think as we do, or have the same root believes and goals. Demonstrably, they do not. Our opponents are not “misguided”. The subscribe to a differnet belief system, founded on a different set of premises. The very word the opposition uses “Islam” means -submission-, the submission of a slave to a master. -All- are slaves, Muslims to Allah and all others to Muslims.
You can ignore that, but you cannot ignore the inevitable outcome of that ignorance. The core of our culture is Liberty and Free Will. In the minds of those Jihadis attacking us, those concepts -do not exist-, and will not be tolerated. This, we are in an -existential- war, like it or not.
Sadly, the one who are preaching “tolerance” will only encourage us to ignore the ones seeking mayhem, until they do something so horrific as to unleash the blood soaked blade with which we have cut down foes before. Seeking tolerance, they will generate bloodbath.
You can ignore reality. You cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.
http://www.breitbart.com/jerusalem/2017/01/29/flashback-obama-2011-suspended-iraq-refugee-program-six-months-terrorism-fears/
“TEL AVIV – Amid the furor over President Donald Trump’s executive order temporarily halting refugees while the government can revamp its flawed screening process, it may be instructive to recall that President Obama in 2011 reportedly quietly suspended the Iraq refugee program for six months over terrorism fears.”
Oops.
Oh the horror of bringing that up, it doesn’t follow the narrative!
A little refresher:
http://iranprimer.usip.org/blog/2015/dec/21/us-iran-differ-visa-waiver-law
The media has zero credibility. Two recent similar policies regarding immigration and refugees completely ignored.
Many clueless idiot moonbat liberals are currently comparing the proposed wall to the Berlin Wall. To them I say to remember Ronald Reagan’s quote to Gorbachev about the same, it was something like “The Berlin Wall was built to keep a Country’s people in like prisoners. Our proposal is building a wall to keep undesirable people out.”
I think its funny/hypocritical that many in the ‘Leftist Elite Class’ feel that the border should be open while they live in gated communities with private security.
I think everybody crying out about ‘open the borders’ should personally sponsor those the wish admit to this country and make them financially/legally responsible. The caveat is they don’t get to pick…they just get a randomly assigned person/family. They find them a place them a place to live, a place to work, and acclimate to life in America…
“Sounds like a lot of work…think I’ll just rant of Facebook and let someone else do the heavy lifting” will be more numerous response I’ll wager.
Random observations:
1) No wall will ever be effective in eliminating illegals. Just as no door locks will ever eliminate burglaries… but it might deter the casual lawbreakers.
2) When we passively allow employers to escape almost scot-free from hiring illegals, we are abetting the lawbreakers, not deterring them.
3) If you attack only the drug cartel heads, the cartels will acquire new heads and it will be business as usual. If there is no demand for illegal drugs, the cartels have no markets and no incentives. The war on drugs requires a nuanced multi-prong attack, not just a single step.
4) Those who would disarm Americans should be required to give up all personal security measures like gated communities, armed guards, etc.
5) If voting and immigration require less verification than flying on a commercial flight from Houston to Dallas, there are fundamental flaws in our system.
Until three years ago, my wife and I, in our many relocations from Texas to Louisiana to Florida, back to Texas, then to New Mexico and finally to Arkansas, had never lived in a gated community. Now that we do, I can tell you that the heightened sense of security is a great comfort. When you don’t have to be constantly vigilant about protecting your home, your vehicles, and your personal “stuff” life becomes more enjoyable. Don’t misunderstand, there’s always a loaded 9mm close by but my chances of ever needing to use it are practically nil.
In those other locations we had to take active precautions against crime and they still weren’t enough. The worst was San Antonio with its proximity to the border and a large illegal community where we were burgled and had cars and bikes stolen despite our defenses.
My point is that the sense of security that comes to individuals living in gated communities is a lesser manifestation of the heightened sense of security that comes to the citizenry of cities, counties and states that are more efficiently policed and countries that maintain efficient control of their borders.
Having lived among many illegals in Texas and New Mexico, I know there are many good people among them, But, there is also a very large criminal element that accounts for a very substantial portion of the crime in this country. If America would control her borders with limited ingress, in effect become a gated country, the entire nation would to some extent, share that greater sense of security I described above.